According to Gaider, EA had a preference for the sci-fi franchise rather than Dragon Age‘s fantasy settings and more strategic gameplay. He wrote about the marketing team also having the same preference since they were unsure of how to market a dark fantasy franchise like Dragon Age, while Mass Effect‘s sci-fi trappings and more action-oriented gameplay were more marketable.

“While I was at BioWare, EA *always* preferred Mass Effect, straight up,” wrote Gaider. “Their Marketing team liked it more. It was modern. It had action. They never quite knew what to do with [Dragon Age], and whenever DA outperformed ME, ME got the excuses. If you ask me, it was always just shy of the axe since DA Origins.”

With his post, Gaider was responding to a fan of the Dragon Age franchise who commented on the sense that EA seemingly had a preference for Mass Effect even from the perspective of someone outside of the industry. A follow-up question was asked about whether the marketing team’s inability to figure out how to work with the Dragon Age franchise led to each game being quite different from its predecessor.

“Maybe in part,” responded Gaider. “I’d say the biggest reason was that, while I was there, the BioWare teams were bad at overreaction. They’d take the feedback/criticism to heart – both our own and the fans’ – and generally fixed that but also over-corrected. And then there was EA’s influence on top of that, yes.”

The first game in the Dragon Age franchise, Dragon Age: Origins, was released all the way back in 2009. Several DLC releases followed, and it also received a full-fledged sequel in 2011 with Dragon Age 2. The series then went quiet for a while as BioWare started wrapping up the Mass Effect trilogy before getting Dragon Age: Inquisition in 2014.

The most recent game in the franchise was last year’s Dragon Age: The Veilguard, released in October 2024 on PC, PS5 and Xbox Series X/S. For more details, check out our review. As for some insight into some of the game design decisions that were made around The Veilguard, check out our coverage of the UX designer’s comments on changing the game’s interface due to feedback from QA teams.

Unfortunately, Dragon Age: The Veilguard underperformed in the market according to EA’s earnings report back in January. EA CEO Andrew Wilson revealed in February that he believed it was because of the RPG’s lack of multiplayer and shared-world features. According to Wilson, despite its warm critical reception, the game failed to resonate with a broader audience in the competitive market.

While I was at BioWare, EA *always* preferred Mass Effect, straight up Their Marketing team liked it more. It was modern. It had action. They never quite knew what to do with DA, and whenever DA outperformed ME, ME got the excuses. If you ask me, it was always just shy of the axe since DA Origins.

— David Gaider (@davidgaider.bsky.social) 2025-04-14T07:11:01.939Z

Maybe in part? I'd say the biggest reason was that, while I was there, the BioWare teams were bad at overreaction. They'd take the feedback/criticism to heart – both our own and the fans' – and generally fixed that but also overcorrected.And then there was EA's influence on top of that, yes.

— David Gaider (@davidgaider.bsky.social) 2025-04-14T07:57:50.921Z

30. Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden

Don’t Nod’s second major action RPG, Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden was released early last year, and it turned out to be a way better experience than Vampyr. Banishers: Ghosts of New Eden was an excellent action role playing game with plenty to do with story being its main focus. Throughout the game’s narrative, players would have to make tough decisions which can result in any of the five endings.

That’s as per Jon Epler, creative director on The Veilguard, who said in a recent interview with Rolling Stone that though he would “love” to see a remastered collection of the first three Dragon Age titles similar to 2021’s Mass Effect: Legendary Edition, it would be a much more “challenging” project due to engine-related issues.

Specifically, unlike the original Mass Effect trilogy – which was built entirely on the flexibility and developer-friendly Unreal Engine – the first three Dragon Age titles were not only built on different engines – with BioWare’s internal Eclipse Engine used for Origins and 2, and EA’s Frostbite for Inquisition – those engines are also more complicated to work with, especially for a remastered collection meant to bring all three games together.

Either way, Epler says you shouldn’t completely discount the possibility regardless.

“I think I’m one of about maybe 20 people left at BioWare who’s actually used Eclipse,” he said. “It’s something that’s not going to be as easy Mass Effect, but we do love the original games. Never say never, I guess that’s what it comes down to.”

Meanwhile, Epler has also confirmed that BioWare has no plans for post-launch DLC for The Veilguard, with BioWare now shifting its full focus to the next Mass Effect as its main project. Read more on that through here.

Dragon Age: The Veilguard is available on PS5, Xbox Series X/S, and PC.

Taking to Twitter, Gaider said that, even in 2016, he felt a resentment from other parts of the studio.

“Even BioWare, which built its success on a reputation for good stories and characters, slowly turned from a company that vocally valued its writers to one where we were… quietly resented, with a reliance on expensive narrative seen as the ‘albatross’ holding the company back,” Gaider said on Twitter.

David Gaider worked with BioWare for 17 years before his departure back in 2016. Gaider worked as the lead writer for Dragon Age: Origins, Dragon Age 2, and Dragon Age: Inquisition. BioWare is currently working on its fourth Dragon Age game, titled Dragon Age: Dreadwolf.

Recently, former BioWare veteran Mark Darrah returned the studio as a consultant to help development on Dragon Age: Dreadwolf. EA is also reportedly bringing in the Mass Effect team to help on the game’s development.

Maybe that sounds like a heavy charge, but it's what I distinctly felt up until I left in 2016. Suddenly all anyone in charge was asking was "how do we have LESS writing?" A good story would simply happen, via magic wand, rather than be something that needed support and priority.

— David Gaider (@davidgaider) May 3, 2023

In a recent interview with USA Today, former BioWare GM Aaryn Flynn talked about the development of Dragon Age: Inquisition, acknowledging that while getting Frostbite up to speed for the development of a massive RPG was certainly a “herculean” task, what was even more challenging was developing the RPG as a cross-gen game for PS3, Xbox 360, PS4, and Xbox One. According to Flynn, having to ensure that the game ran well on the considerably weaker old-gen consoles “crushed” a lot of the team’s ambitions for what they wanted to do with the project.

“I’d say the biggest compromise came from the fact that we had to ship Inquisition on the Xbox 360 and PS3 at the same time as we did on the PS4 and Xbox One,” Flynn said. “That crushed so much ambition because we didn’t have the team size or the time to differentiate those things, truly. So you had to kind of develop the lowest common denominator. And as that came in, that certainly beat out some expectations and ambitions we had for certain fun features in gameplay”

Interestingly, Flynn went on to mention The Witcher 3, another massive RPG that came out just a year later and turned out to be the better experience, partly – according to Flynn – because it wasn’t a cross-gen game.

“In contrast, CD Projekt didn’t do that with The Witcher 3, a few months later, and I think their game was better for it,” he said.

Flynn is currently heading up Inflexion Games, with the studio busy with the development of upcoming co-op survival title Nightingale.

BioWare, meanwhile, is working on the next Dragon Age game, which, according to reports, will not be cross-gen, and will launch late next year.

Microsoft recently unveiled and kicked off FPS Boost for backward compatibility on Xbox Series X/S, which natively boosts the frame rate of select titles (though that might come at the cost of resolution in some cases, it seems). The feature has launched with support from an initial batch of five games, namely Watch Dogs 2, Far Cry 4, UFC 4, Sniper Elite 4, and New Super Lucky’s Tale. It seems, however, that if things had gone a little differently, that batch might have had one pretty big additional game.

As per Xbox’s Larry “Major Nelson” Hryb, BioWare’s 2014 RPG Dragon Age: Inquisition was planned for the first batch of FPS Boost supported games, but things didn’t exactly pan out. “As with all best laid plans, things sometimes change at the last minute,” said Hryb.

Given the fact that Microsoft were looking at the game as one of the first to support FPS Boost, the obvious implication would be that it’s still being looked at, and might be one of the games to receive support for the feature in the near future (hopefully even the next batch). Microsoft have said that they’ll be adding support for FPS Boost to more games going forward, while Hryb says we’ll be hearing more “in the coming weeks and months.”

Don’t expect every single backward compatibility game to support FPS Boost though, as the feature might not be possible in certain games. Read more on that through here.

https://twitter.com/majornelson/status/1362917586212511749

BioWare’s precipitous fall from grace in the last few years has also been accompanied by their forced adoption of DICE’s Frostbite engine, which almost every internally developed EA game now uses. Frostbite is a great engine, that can put out some gorgeous games, and has created some of the best looking shooters on the market. Unfortunately, it’s also completely unsuited to RPGs, which has led to BioWare struggling to get it to do what they want—and ignoring other critical things in their development process (such as quality assurance) along the way.

This is no longer just speculation. No less than former BioWare General Manager Aaron Flynn has admitted as much in a candid interview with GamesIndustry, where he has pointed out that though the Frostbite Engine has a lot of strengths, trying to use it for RPG development is like attempting to push a square peg into a round hole.

“… we switched to an engine called Frostbite. And Frostbite is an EA internal engine; very powerful, fast, beautiful, purpose built to do some really cool stuff. But it’s also extremely delicate and needs a huge crew,” he said.

“Incredible, impressive feats of technology, really at the bleeding edge of what’s possible,” Flynn said. “But they require a huge crew of folks to maintain them and get that optimum performance out of them. And that really is the metaphor for at least the earliest days of Frostbite.

“It was getting harder and harder to make the content that people wanted,” Flynn said of his experience with Frostbite. “It was harder and harder to move that content through these pipelines and do things. And even though we had more people — we had more teams, more folks — we were slowing down the rate at which we could build and craft these experiences.”

There have been reports that Respawn’s ongoing success (first with Apex Legends and then with Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order) may have convinced EA to stop forcing all developers to use Frostbite, which… is a good, if long in the coming, realization. All I can hope is that freed of the shackles of Frostbite, BioWare can start putting out the sort of generation defining experiences that they were once synonymous with.

Mad Max

Veering away from massive open world destruction into post-apocalyptic, vehicular exploration, Mad Max was an odd turn for Avalanche Studios. It was about upgrading your car, the Magnum Opus, and taking on convoys. It was about assaulting bases and brawling with baddies. There were the unoriginal side quests, sure, but the sheer expanse of its rolling dunes and spectacle of the vehicle combat helped Mad Max stand out.

In this feature, we’ll be taking a look at all the games that BioWare has ever made (barring a couple that were on mobile devices or made for web browsers), and ranking every single one of them, starting with the worst one, and counting down right to the very best.

Without further ado, let’s get started.

#17. SHATTERED STEEL

Though BioWare is a studio associated with RPGs and storytelling, the first game they ever made was something completely different. Shattered Steel was a mech action title, which took cues from the MechWarrior series, but went for a more accessible and action-oriented style of gameplay (which you can translate to “it had more mindless explosions).

Shattered Steel was a decent enough game, with enjoyable action and a story that, for its time, was at least mildly entertaining. It was, however, a far cry from the kind of games BioWare would build its reputation on and go on to be associated with, and is, as a result, often altogether forgotten.

A default, Common assault rifle which is better than end-game loot. An end-game loot system based on Inscriptions that didn’t even fully fit with a player’s weaponry, forget all the wasteful perks that are absolutely pointless. A system that gave players Common and Uncommon items for completing the toughest activities on the highest difficulties. It’s bad enough that Anthem suffered from these flaws, which are pretty much patched now (though the drop rate for Masterworks and Legendaries at GM difficulties continues to be pitiful).

"What defines “identity” in a video game? For any game, I believe it defines one’s purpose within that infrastructure. Why are you here? Why aren’t you somewhere else?"

It also doesn’t help that a number of bugs and problems – like those affecting one’s completion of the Tyrant Mine and The Temple of Scar or quickplay being absolutely busted – still persist. At the end of the day, BioWare can fix any number of these bugs or reduce their impact enough in the short-term to offer a more palatable experience. See decreased loading times.

However, after seeing and playing enough of Anthem, another major problem has come to light. It’s not so much gameplay-related as it has to do with story-telling, atmosphere and themes. As it stands, Anthem is a game craving an identity. It’s so desperately wanting in terms of an identity that players would want to connect to in the long-term.

What defines “identity” in a video game? For any game, I believe it defines one’s purpose within that infrastructure. Why are you here? Why aren’t you somewhere else? Why are you completing these objectives instead of going off and doing something else? What propels you to keep doing the same thing, over and over again, hoping for a different result? That last question could be answered with an addictive and satisfying gameplay loop.

After all, you’re not just grinding out Warframe‘s Nightwave series because you want those snazzy Arcanes, Orokin Catalysts and Weapon Slots (though they are appealing). You’re not just fighting Eidolons, hoping for a decent Arcane to drop so it can be sold for mad Platinum, or grinding out Relics endlessly in the hope of Prime Parts or, at the very least, Prime Trash that will fetch Ducats. The truth of the matter is that because of Warframe‘s satisfying gameplay loop, which also offers plenty of variety in how you enjoy the game, you’d be grinding away for something in your spare time. The grind is almost in perfect unison with the gameplay in that respect.

"“Purpose” extends beyond that though. When you started playing Borderlands 2, it was probably from the perspective of someone who enjoyed the first game. You loved that looting cycle and wanted more of it."

That same train of thought could be applied to any number of looter games. You’re playing Borderlands 2 to get some sweet guns and one-tap enemies into blood mists. You’re playing Destiny 2 to get some new guns, awesome rolls and shiny armour. You’re playing Path of Exile because you mostly want to craft powerful new items, try out new skills, unlock new Uniques and so on. Playing new “content” and unlocking new rewards is a big motivator in games like these. Their satisfying gameplay loops help you to keep playing, long after you’d probably have quit.

“Purpose” extends beyond that though. When you started playing Borderlands 2, it was probably from the perspective of someone who enjoyed the first game. You loved that looting cycle and wanted more of it. However, the story pulled you in, presenting a hero that was ultimately the worst kind of villain. You were rebelling against him and went on an epic journey to unravel more about the mysteries of the Vaults, Pandora, the Sirens and the Guardians. All said and done, at the end of the day, you were a treasure seeker, a mercenary and a killer all wrapped up into one, driven by a single purpose – Vault hunting.

Don’t get me wrong – loot is still a core part of the experience. Unlike many modern games, Borderlands 2 knew how to manage that cycle. Incremental upgrades went hand in hand with unique styles, ranging from fast-firing and large magazine sizes to different elements and skill gains. To this day, there haven’t been a lot of games that can achieve that balance of easy build creation versus hardcore min-maxing while still offering a fun gameplay loop and varying play-styles. Yes, that’s even keeping in mind that at the very top of OP8 difficulty, you had to have certain guns, items and classes to succeed.

"At one point, the Freelancers were a proud faction until something went wrong at the Heart of Rage. And by something “going wrong”, we mean the Freelancers entering a massive battle and barely escaping with their lives. So why do the people of Fort Tarsis hate them?"

However, this isn’t just about defining a game’s loop or why you’re spending so much time shooting the same enemies over and over again. It’s about that long-term fulfillment and identity. Let’s take another example with Path of Exile. The sheer complexity of the game, how it handles currency and crafting, and its intricately woven end-game are about more than just a steady curve of growing power. When you first start the game, you’re very much like the character that’s washed up on the shores of Wraeclast. Nothing. Only capable of slicing, spell-casting and smashing through the weakest of enemies. The world feels simple, perhaps a little too simple…until you start listening to what the NPCs are saying and meeting the terrible entities that have influenced the region. That downward spiral through build development pretty much matches your own struggles to say alive. Tumbling ever further down the rabbit hole, you won’t know the right choices or what to do spec towards next. You can only hope that it – and the accompanying journey – leads to something fulfilling.

As an Exile though, you have nothing to lose. Even your sanity is offered up to the foulest of beasts and beings to become stronger. Carving your place out in this world of immortal syndicates, monster-infested mines, collapsing memory fractures, ancient ruins and beast-hunting maniacs is as much a part of the story as your own personal narrative. Your identity as an Exile is broad but it’s defined. Your purpose is manifold but hinges on the power of your will.

By comparison, exactly what are you in Anthem? You’re a Freelancer, someone who can pilot a Javelin and isn’t a Sentinel. At one point, the Freelancers were a proud faction until something went wrong at the Heart of Rage. And by something “going wrong”, we mean the Freelancers entering a massive battle and barely escaping with their lives. So why do the people of Fort Tarsis hate them? Why are they eager to involve them in anything if they hate them so much? The Freelancers suffered heavy losses and they’re the ones who are blamed, even despite the fact that they helped repel the Dominion (as the opening cutscene exemplified) to protect the fort. Why would the citizenry be so quick to turn on them, especially when there’s no opposing in-game faction that’s politicking for the same?

"What is your purpose in this world? What is this world defined by the Shapers and the Anthem? Is it your job to find out what’s going on? Are you destined for anything? "

As a Freelancer, you take on various odd jobs. Most of it is “go here and do this” but none of it really has any significance. You stopped the Heart of Rage. You defeated the Monitor (but not really). You helped join Mathias’s three personalities back together. You helped Dax (a princess who’s also a Sentinel) recover her aunt’s journal and even rescued a bunch of people who were seemingly trapped in limbo. Except for that last part, there is nothing of any significance or importance that’s been achieved. The Monitor fuses with the Heart of Rage and seemingly has control over life and death, yet you overcome him by shooting his weak point a lot. Not even because you’re dealing mad DPS but because you just kept shooting him for a long enough time and he was too stupid to figure out how to effectively kill you.

This isn’t to say the game doesn’t provide any real ideals as to what constitutes a Freelancer’s identity and purpose. It tells you quite a bit, actually. However, the gameplay doesn’t quite reflect that. Like a delivery boy, you’re taking on these random tasks for people who apparently don’t like you. One’s in-game “identity” should reflect the gameplay they’re involved in. Conversely, what you’re doing should properly reflect who are you in-game. That’s how you “identify” with your avatar in games like these. Anthem‘s gameplay has you going around, collecting things that don’t really matter and probably using whatever equipment can be scrounged in the process.

What is your purpose in this world? What is this world defined by the Shapers and the Anthem? Is it your job to find out what’s going on? Are you destined for anything? You’re not even someone who’s clawing their way up to a powerful status. A venerable suit of Iron Man armour or four is tossed in your direction with nary any reason or sense of accomplishment. It’s a gift rather than something you’ve earned, much less a privilege that someone has bestowed upon you.

This is perhaps my biggest problem with Anthem currently. For all the bugs that can be fixed and drop-rates that can be buffed (or nerfed because BioWare apparently hates when you earn loot), the game’s attempts to reconcile your actions with a greater purpose are very poorly executed.

"Even vanilla Destiny which shipped with a broken and boring story, much of it confined to cards you had to read on a separate website, gave you the Vault of Glass."

I know that many games, especially looter shooters, can be distilled down to raw gameplay terms. You are basically running from Point A to Point B in Borderlands 2, killing Bandits along the way and retrieving a Shield Core for Sanctuary. But there is a greater purpose – you’re trying to find Corporeal Reiss and rescue him. Upon finding Reiss, you learn the Shield Core has been taken by the Bandits, with the accompanying scenery proving that he put up a fight. As he passes on, asking to be woken up when he’s not on Pandora anymore, you’re tasked with slaughtering many Bandits in addition to retrieving the Core. Reiss may be a throwaway cog in the grand scheme of things but this helped turn the wheel in your journey to become a legendary Vault Hunter.

Even vanilla Destiny which shipped with a broken and boring story, much of it confined to cards you had to read on a separate website, gave you the Vault of Glass. It gave you these extraordinary circumstances where the threats felt significant. The power to unmake creation by the manipulation of time, as the Vex had achieved with the Oracles? The grand plan to integrate the Vex into every single time stream with the power of Atheon, thus necessitating trips to the past and future to gather the one weapon – the Aegis – that could possibly defeat it? Yes, more information was provided by the descriptions on the weapons (especially regarding the Guardians who tried and failed to stop the Vex) than through cutscenes or dialogue. But the Vault of Glass did an excellent job in conveying through its gameplay how big a threat the Vex were. If anything, the lacklustre campaign and side-missions actually helped reinforce the raid’s impact since it was so vastly superior to everything else available at the time.

The same applies to The Last Wish raid in Destiny 2: Forsaken. Something has been manipulating Prince Uldren from behind the scenes and it’s tucked away in The Dreaming City. It’s helping Taken manifest and bringing ruin to the Awoken’s home country. You venture into the inner reaches of the city, climbing ever higher until you reach the Keep of Voices. By then, the threat is revealed to be an Ahamkara named Riven, Taken through the power of Oryx and manipulating events to ultimately be set free. You’re tasked with purifying its heart…which is exactly what Riven (and whatever other force is acting behind the scenes) wanted.

"No matter how much you improve and build upon this in the name of “games as a service”, without a purpose and a compelling identity, you’ll ultimately end up nowhere regardless of how good the game looks or how wonderful the soundtrack is."

The Dreaming City is now cursed and on a three week long cycle where the same events repeat. Till now in-game, the cycle hasn’t been broken. This constant war of attrition is visualized and showcased, whether it’s through one’s conversations with the Queen Mara Sov, the Ghost’s frustration at trying to fight it and ultimately making no difference, or the actual city being consumed by Taken Blights. In a way, it represents the constant struggle of the Guardian with no clear end in sight. It also helped evolve the player’s purpose within the story, providing a wrinkle to one’s relationship to the Light and whether it was actually as justly clear-cut as previous battles.

By comparison, Anthem does little to actually convey how much of a threat the Heart of Rage or even the Shaper artifacts can be. That too after the Heart of Rage was just there for years without really causing any problems for the people of Fort Tarsis. It’s only when their enemy, the Dominion, tried to harness it that they had cause to worry. And due to how badly the Monitor actually fared in the final battle, it makes you wonder if there was any reason to worry. Who cares about the Shaper Artifacts having the power to affect gravity when you don’t see it with your own eyes?

There are dozens of examples I could provide about games, that too in the looter genre, which succeed in defining their identity and yours within the context of the gameplay. However, it’s incredible that this utter lack of identity and purpose should come from BioWare. The same BioWare that masterfully conveyed the threat that the Reapers – and by extension, Cerberus and the Collectors – could pose in the Mass Effect trilogy. The same BioWare that showcased the effects of the rifts on Thedas and the threat the Corypheus could be in Dragon Age Inquisition (the fetch quests had way more meaning as well. Fight me).

I could see one arguing that Path of Exile and Warframe managed to set out one’s purpose and identity over years of consistent development, that they weren’t always so strongly defined in those departments from the beginning. However, the key difference is that those games had glimmers of that potential from day one. Their “souls” were apparent from the very beginning, regardless of how much work it took to eventually iron out. Can we really say the same for Anthem at this point? No matter how much you improve and build upon this in the name of “games as a service”, without a purpose and a compelling identity, you’ll ultimately end up nowhere regardless of how good the game looks or how wonderful the soundtrack is.

Note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of, and should not be attributed to, GamingBolt as an organization.