Former Dragon Age executive producer Mark Darrah defended BioWare’s decision to try something different with Anthem, speaking in an interview with Destin Legarie after the looter shooter’s server shutdown this week. Darrah said the studio has a history of moving between genres and experimenting with new directions.
In the interview Darrah pushed back on the idea that BioWare should have stuck to single-player RPGs. He pointed to past projects as examples of the studio changing course and said that line of criticism does not hold much weight. “My feeling is that BioWare’s always been changing,” he said. “I mean, by that argument, we should have never made Neverwinter Nights because we were a 2D RPG maker. We should never have made Mass Effect because we were a tactical RPG maker, not an action RPG maker. So, I don’t know that that argument holds a lot of weight for me. Studios evolve and they try new things. Was Anthem too big of a reach? Yeah, for sure. But could you tell at the time? I don’t know. I don’t know that you could.”
Darrah also addressed blame for Anthem’s failure. He acknowledged that Electronic Arts deserved criticism while saying it was not solely EA’s fault. “It’s easy to blame EA and certainly they deserve a bunch of blame for Anthem, but it’s not all their fault,” he said.The comments came during a wider conversation prompted by Anthem’s recent shutdown. Fans and groups such as the Stop Killing Games initiative have used the closure to call for changes to how live games are handled and to argue players should have more say in a game’s lifespan.
Darrah has spoken about other BioWare projects in public appearances. He previously discussed the cancelled Dragon Age pitch codenamed Joplin in a separate conversation, reflecting on the studio’s past projects and decisions in an interview about Joplin. The full interview with Destin Legarie is available on YouTube and includes the portion where Darrah reflects on Anthem and BioWare’s history of change. You can watch the interview on YouTube.
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Anthem
Developed by BioWare
Anthem is a shared-world action RPG, where players can delve into a vast landscape teeming with amazing technology and forgotten treasures. This is a world where Freelancers are called upon to defeat savage beasts, ruthless marauders, and forces plotting to conquer humanity.
- Genre: Shooter, Role-playing (RPG), Adventure
- Platforms: PlayStation 4, PC (Microsoft Windows), Xbox One
- Modes: Multiplayer, Co-operative
- Release: 2019-02-22
- Publisher: Electronic Arts
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Age Rating:
ACB M / ESRB T / PEGI 16 / CERO C / USK 16 / GRAC 15+ / CLASS_IND 14
- IGDB Rating: 63.3/100
