Andromeda's Failure has "Refocused" BioWare, Claims Manager

There was a time when BioWare could do no wrong. When Mass Effect and Dragon Age owned the role-playing genre and were seen as the standard unit of measurement for quality game writing. And for many years, BioWare rode those good vibe waves… but when they tried to cash in the popularity of Mass Effect (outside of that Mass Effect 3 ending) with a largely unnecessary spin-off, Andromeda and it turned out to be a pile of garbage, all - or at least, most - of that goodwill evaporated. Maybe being latched onto EA exaggerated the negative press around the game a bit, or maybe it was the fact the company had seemed to fall from grace, but either way, BioWare has a lot to prove with its next title… doubly so since Anthem appears ripe for EA to try to exploit it with crappy monetization practices.

But general manager Casey Hudson seems to think that we can learn more from failure than success, and has recently posted on how recent events have caused BioWare to re-focus its efforts on becoming the RPG king once more.

"When I returned to BioWare last summer, Mass Effect: Andromeda had just been released and there was a significant movement among players asking for a story DLC that would answer questions surrounding the fate of the quarians. As you know, we were not able to deliver story DLC for Andromeda—this was as frustrating for us as it was for players, and it was something we knew we had to solve in future games,”

"That experience ultimately became a defining moment in refocusing BioWare’s mission. We need to delight players with new experiences and innovation, but we must stay focused on the importance of the world, character, and storytelling elements that players expect from our games. And our games must be designed to continue delivering new stories and experiences, in an ongoing relationship with players in the worlds we’re evolving together."

Well, you’ve got a lot of evolving to do if you want to get away from the shadow cast by EA, BioWare. Best of luck for all our sakes.