Bioware Gets Sent Cupcakes, For Good Reasons This Time

It seems like Bioware is going to have a long, delicious history with cupcakes, if this trend keeps up.

SO.  Back in 2012, as you may or may not recall, fans were upset about the Ending of Mass Effect 3—upset because the ending of the game was confusing, obtuse, and the paragon/renegade alignment of your personal Shepard didn’t count for anything.  Fans were so pissed off they tried a myriad of ways to express their dissatisfaction—from protests to petitions, even going so far as to try to sue Bioware.  But of all their petitions, the most interesting was fans sending the company a whole bunch of cupcakes.  All of them different colors, but tasting the same: a fun rift on the ‘pointlessness’ of the choice in the game.



It's hard to say if the cupcakes finally did the job, but eventually Bioware did release the “extended edition” DLC for free, which, while it didn’t change the endings, did elaborate on them, which seemed to sate the audience.

But now Bioware has gotten cupcakes sent to them AGAIN—but this time, not out of protest.  Rather, these treats as thanks to this year’s E3 presentation of their latest title, Dragon Age: Inquisition.  What happened? 

Funny thing.  Dragon Age is a lot like other RPG’s in that you can decide the gender of your character at the start of the game.   Pretty standard.  But in most RPG’s that give you the option to choose your gender, in promotional material for those games the default main character is male.  I mean, just think about it: Standard Gray Warden was male.  Standard Hawke was male.  Standard Dovakhin was male.  Chosen Undead?  Male.  Commander Shepard?  Male.  

But in Dragon Age: Inquisition?  They were showing off the female model, making it the ‘standard’ for the game.   Which is new for just about every game I can think of except Saints Row.

So, Project CupcakeQuisition was started (which, while fun, is a really clunky name) and to thank Bioware for this, an overall heavy focus on female characters in their games, and their general support for the LGBT community, over 22 dozen mini cupcakes were sent to the Bioware office.

Of course, Bioware was much happier to get this batch of cupcakes. Bioware developer Allan Schumacher and Karin Weekes both tweeted their thanks, and overall developer response  was, obviously, very positive.

While it's kind of sad this industry is in a state where something as mundane as this is something that warrants reward, it's still rather heartwarming to see someone take the time to do it.  Here’s hoping other companies get a sweet tooth and start trying to earn their own cupcakes.