LogInBioWare worked on Facebook games under false pretenses.
BioWare
Working for a famous company sounds like a dream, but it's certainly not for everyone, and BioWare's co-founder Greg Zeschuk confirmed it in a recent episode of My Perfect Console podcast.
EA buying the Mass Effect and Dragon Age creator in 2007 was a point of no return for many fans, who say that was when the studio lost itself. However, while Zeschuk admitted it was challenging to work for such a huge corporation, he believes BioWare managed to succeed in its endeavors.
"I like to comment that EA gives you enough rope to hang yourself," Zeschuk said (via Eurogamer). "And what I mean by that is you have to learn to work within the structure and I think we did quite well, if you look at the Mass Effect [trilogy that] came out of there. It was actually a pretty successful run."
Alas, it was not what Zeschuk himself enjoyed. "You have to understand how to work within a big company. And, for me, that was the end. It was like, 'Oh, I don't like big companies'. So I knew by year two that I was going to leave at some point. I just didn't know when."
The time would come in 2012 when Zeschuk and another co-founder, Ray Muzyka, announced their decision to retire from the game industry.
Despite that, Zeschuk said that EA gave BioWare's developers enough freedoms, even in questionable ventures.
"There's all kinds of shenanigans we did," Zeschuk shared. "We actually made Facebook games under false pretenses, under false names actually."
BioWare
BioWare was not allowed to make mobile games, so some employees created a fake company name to test games like one about a yeti delivering gifts. "You can't have a company of cowboys," Zeschuk said. "I wouldn't say we were cowboys, we were usually somewhat calculating in what we did. But we liked to try stuff. So when they discovered we had a couple of Apple development devices and we weren't in the mobile division, they were like, 'What are you doing?'"
While there were ups and downs during his time at BioWare, one of the worst decisions Zeschuk recalled was releasing Jade Empire early under Microsoft's urging.
"Microsoft was like, 'No, no, you should release it now, right at the end of the cycle, because it's a great time,'" Zeschuk explained. "It was the worst advice, absolute moronic advice from them, the stupidest thing ever. ... We could have rezzed [Jade Empire] up, we could have amped it up. We could have said no. We just missed... I wish I'd said, 'This is a terrible mistake, give us another six months, give us the chance to make it a launch title for 360' and we'd have had another franchise, and then who knows. I just think it would have been a way more successful product at the beginning of a cycle than the end, because by the time it came out people weren't even buying Xbox anymore, they were waiting for the next one."
The studio had an issue with another game, though, the infamous Mass Effect 3, or rather its ending, which left fans reeling. Zeschuk thinks the "intentions were good," but game development is a complicated process.
"Your dream scenario is [to] release a game no one's really heard of and do it really well, because as soon as the expectations are there, it's really tough," he said. "And the other extreme pressure on the other side of that... you got these giant business conglomerates that are pushing for certain release dates and release times. At BioWare, when Ray [Muzyka] and I ran [it], our most effective thing was pushing for the dates that made the most sense that made the best possible game.
Now, the future of BioWare is muddy after the heavily criticized release of Dragon Age: The Veilguard, but hopefully, the next Mass Effect will bring the studio back into the list of industry leaders.
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