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Confirmed: Dragon Age: The Veilguard's Writers & Producers Laid Off as Part of BioWare's Restructuring

Despite the studio burying the terminations beneath corporate jargon, social media posts from former team members confirm that the firings did take place.

Earlier today, BioWare's General Manager Gary McKay issued a public statement announcing that the studio is undergoing restructuring to focus on the development of Mass Effect 5, led by veterans from the original trilogy such as Mike Gamble, Preston Watamaniuk, Derek Watts, and Parrish Ley.

BioWare

Buried beneath corporate jargon was a line stating that BioWare no longer requires "support from the full studio," with many employees being reassigned to other teams within Electronic Arts that had open roles, which, when translated to plain English, suggests that some team members were, in fact, laid off as part of the restructuring, even though McKay avoided confirming that explicitly.

Over the past few hours, however, a number of social media posts have surfaced online, revealing the names of at least some of the employees who got fired from BioWare today.

According to posts shared on LinkedIn and Bluesky, BioWare's restructuring has led to the termination of Dragon Age: The Veilguard's Lead Writer Trick Weekes, Lead Editor Karin West-Weekes, and Narrative Editor Ryan Cormier. Additionally, BioWare Producer Jennifer Cheverie Cott, Associate Game Producer Daniel Steed, Senior Product Manager Lina Anderson, and Senior Systems Designer Michelle Flamm were also let go, while Senior Writer Sheryl Chee – who wrote Dragon Age's Leliana, Isabela, Blackwall, and Harding – and Cinematic Designer Derek Wilks were both moved to EA Motive.

The restructuring comes a week after Electronic Arts revealed that Dragon Age: The Veilguard has engaged only about 1.5 million players – indicating that the number of copies sold might be even lower – and fell 50% short of the publisher's expectations. Shortly thereafter, the developers shipped The Veilguard's Patch 5 Release Notes, which featured the words "dareth shiral" – "safe journey," or more commonly, "farewell" in the in-game Elven language – suggesting that the game won't receive any more quality-of-life updates going forward.

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Comments 9

  • Anonymous user

    Shocker..... Game was overall garbage with decent combat. The writing and atmosphere were terrible and off brand. Forced dialog of stuff no one asked for or cared about.

    8

    Anonymous user

    ·9 hours ago·
  • Anonymous user

    Tried the game and actually liked the gameplay whatsoever, but overall boring story got me quit after 5ish hours... so I think they didn't make the wrong choice on this one

    1

    Anonymous user

    ·4 hours ago·
  • Anonymous user

    Why are people upset to see minorities represented in media like video games? It means so much to see a version of yourself represented onscreen. I loved how they there was a varied cast of companions and personalities. I think it would be more upsetting if people were fired for being inclusive.

    0

    Anonymous user

    ·5 hours ago·
  • Anonymous user

    Doesn't matter what you do. If you fail  hard enough to tank your entire company, you're probably going to lose your job...

    1

    Anonymous user

    ·7 hours ago·
  • Anonymous user

    Majority of the departees appear to be writers so no shock there, whatsoever. That game's writing was absolutely awful at the best of times and arguably insulting at the worst.

    Additionally, while it's supposition on my part based purely on surnames, it looks like the Lead Writer and Lead Editor are related. Really, BioWare? Sure, it's not impossible to have an effective writer-editor relationship between two people who are close but it's certainly not advised. The editor is going to have an implicit bias towards the writer.

    3

    Anonymous user

    ·7 hours ago·
  • Anonymous user

    Good riddance. Now the industry knows who NOT to hire for writing/editing work. The fact that these people consider themselves "professionals" is laughable

    5

    Anonymous user

    ·7 hours ago·
  • Anonymous user

    They should have brought the game back to it's roots in gameplay, tone and narrative. I believe that the success of BG3 proves this would have been accepted and probably embraced. For me DA: Origins was one of the best games I've ever played, for what's it's worth...

    4

    Anonymous user

    ·8 hours ago·
  • Anonymous user

    I'll say this Vailguard isn't a DragonAge game. When developers sorry activists and writers engage in identity politics by pushing their ideologies into a game when we the gamers just want to escape the BS that's being pushed already on us. Well this is what happens when these publishers give money to these kinds of people. The "modern audience" failed to show up when it counted to support these kinds of games. All can exist in this space but you have to understand your "core audience" FIRST before you start catering to the minority.

    6

    Anonymous user

    ·8 hours ago·
  • Anonymous user

    So what are the gamers that have beeen waiting and loyal to the franchise

    0

    Anonymous user

    ·10 hours ago·

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