Support NeoGAF

[Yoboman]

I'm replaying the Mass Effect games and it reminded me of how good Bioware once was. If you compare their output from 2013 - 2022 compared to 2003 - 2012 it's insane the drop off

2003-2012:
Neverwinter Nights
KOTOR
Jade Empire
Mass Effect 1, 2 & 3
Dragon Age Origin
Dragon Age 2

2013-22:
Dragon Age Inquisition
Mass Effect Andromeda
Anthem

They were on top of the world and seemingly turned over night into a shadow of themselves

 

[Fuz]

It's a tie between them and blizzard.

 

[Magic Carpet]

These are the guys who made the Ironman in the Rainforest online Destiny like game, I think.
Yea they kind of suck

 

[Wildebeest]

Bioware fans became so fanatical, it was more like a cult than a fanbase.

 

[Kilau]

Valve

 

[01011001]

as someone who never liked even a single game they made... no

 

[ToTTenTranz]

IMO they became social activists first, game developers distant second.
The talented people who disagreed with this direction were the first to go away. The talented people who agreed with the direction but saw the clusterfuck happening went away after that.
What's that's left are mostly the non-talented people who want to be social activists and probably fostered a climate that only welcomes similar people.

 

[remember_spinal]

Tie between them and BGS

Valve

While valve stopped actually making games, you can’t put them in the same ballpark simply due to the fact that they released Half Life Alyx. They aren’t putting out junk

 

[01011001]

Valve

 

[Rykan]

Not disappointed in the slightest.

They were purchased by EA, so we could all see the writing on the wall. They are probably only one flop or "Not living up to expectations" away from reaching the final stage of being EA'd.

 

[Kikorin]

They are like Gamefreak on steroids. I've read the CEOs of the company always did everything without a clear vision and at the end they were convinced some magic would happens and theirs games turned out good for some reason, and it worked until games has become too complex, than all the structure fallen apart.

 

[lmimmfn]

The downward spiral all started with Dragon Age 2, what a POS after the fantastic Origin

 

[LostDonkey]

From is my personal pick.

They made ONE decent game years ago and then just made the same game over and over and over and over and over.......

 

[Punished Miku]

From is my personal pick.

They made ONE decent game years ago and then just made the same game over and over and over and over and over.......

Exactly. It's not much of a downgrade. They were in a bubble because they were one of the first to have a lot of dialogue and choices. But their actual game design chops were pretty limited. They basically just copied D&D. It's not magic that they suddenly failed. They were never that amazing. They had one great template they used over and over. When they deviated from that, it wasn't great.

 

[Damigos]

Yes, they are.

It's a tie between them and blizzard.

At least Blizzard gave us DragonFlight, Legion, Hearthstone, Overwatch 1

 

[ungalo]

Like a lot of studios nowadays Bioware is just a name.

I'd say Rare because in the 360 era i still believed they were a really special studio. Sea of Thieves was kind of a miracle but it seems they went into dev hell mode again for Everwild. And anyway Everwild always looked like shit to me, nothing to do with Rare.

 

[Holammer]

Bioware went from hero to zero.

While valve stopped actually making games, you can’t put them in the same ballpark simply due to the fact that they released Half Life Alyx. They aren’t putting out junk

Don't forget Artifact and Dota Underlords. Both failed quite spectacularly, but neither was such a "my face is tired" trash fire it put the company reputation into question.

 

[Laptop1991]

Bethesda Game Studios for me after Skyrim, trying to multiplayer their SP franchises to follow GTA Online's success to make money from stores. shouldn't have to wait all this time for a new Elder Scroll, the game Todd said everyone was asking about 4 and a half years ago!, the game we ain't getting for years, although most studios haven't done that well in the last 10 years imo.

 

[Umbasaborne]

Yep, as a former bioware fan the fall was fucking tragic. Their last good game was dragon age inquisition and that was a decade ago. It seems like a number of factors caught up with them, the cost and time needed to make these games is far greater than it was when they were making the mass effect trilogy and dragon age 1-3, so when they had two major missteps in a row with andromeda and anthem, they were unable to immediatley recover.

By 2019 when it was clear anthem wasn’t going anywhere, the next dragon age game was still very early in development. It then had to restart development because it was no longer going to be the destiny esque live game they originally envisioned. Mass effect was another beast all togeather. They were ready to let that series die after andromeda bombed, it wasn’t until the legendary editions came out and were beloved that bioware and ea realized that mass effect did not have to die.

So here we are, due to rising dev costs and time, as well as alot of studio mismanagement, bioware simply cannot match the pace of what they were releasing a decade ago. I hope that the next mass effect and dragon age are great, but its clear that when those games do release, they will be the only bioware games this generation.

Triple a development has been permanatley fucked and i dont think that there is a way for big devs like bioware or naughty dog to get out as many games as they used to be able to. The time it took them to make 3 ps3 games is now needed to make one game.

 

[remember_spinal]

From is my personal pick.

They made ONE decent game years ago and then just made the same game over and over and over and over and over.......

But its a reaaaally good game

 

[Nemesisuuu]

And on the list you leave out the best game Bioware ever made - Baldur's Gate 2 - if anything, real disappointment over here is first post.

Don't shoot me pls, just am little triggered over here.

 

[bender]

They've been in steady decline since they peaked in 2000.

 

[The Cockatrice]

Dragon Age Inquisition

Agreed but this pick is debatable. Pretty sure this was gaf's 4th pick for goty and it is factually ten times better than DA2. I personally replayed it this year and it holds up incredibly well visually and gameplay-wise. Sure the side quests and collectibles are garbage and most of your companions like Sera are dogshit but the main story with Solas and especially the final DLC are top Bioware, you cant change my mind. Inquisition also has some incredible-looking locations and character models. Looks better than a lot of games released to this day.

Spoiler

 

[Denton]

I even actually enjoyed Inquisition, Andromeda and Anthem (played them long after release fully patched up on high end PC), and I would still probably say yes. Compared to ME trilogy, DAO and KOTOR those last three games of theirs are really weak.

 

[Aenima]

I enjoyed DA Inquisition more than previous Dragon Age games. I did not disliked Andromeda as much as the memes make it look. They just seem more inconsistent than they used to be.

Having EA focus on multiplayer dont made then any favors as shown on Athem. I just hope they can deliver a good game for the next Dragon Age.

 

[SlimySnake]

Nah. Despite their flaws I liked Andromeda, DAI and Anthem.

I think Valve going completely MIA for the last 15 years is much worse.

 

[Kilau]

Tie between them and BGS



While valve stopped actually making games, you can’t put them in the same ballpark simply due to the fact that they released Half Life Alyx. They aren’t putting out junk

This just makes them more disappointing for me. Which is the OP question, not that they are bad but disappointing.

 

[Oberstein]

I enjoyed DA Inquisition more than previous Dragon Age games. I did not disliked Andromeda as much as the memes make it look. They just seem more inconsistent than they used to be.

I just hope they can deliver a good game for the next Dragon Age.

Let's be honest, It's going to be the same woke shit as usual.

Leaked Dragon Age IV Cutscene:

 

[01011001]

This just makes them more disappointing for me. Which is the OP question, not that they are bad but disappointing.

Valve has the rare luxury of not having to release games to stay alive, so they can wait until they have a title that they are proud of and confident in.

so IMO if Valve announces a big budget title it's automatically worth taking note of, which can't be said for almost any other company out there.

they might have a disappointingly low output but that's not necessarily a bad thing

 

[Kokoloko85]

I made a thread about this in like 2019.
Most people said Bioware and Bethesda.
Id add in Valve and Konami

 

[lachesis]

I would say Konami. Many devs have a few hit franchises but Konami sits on a treasure hoard of them and do absolutely nothing (almost).

 

[Kilau]

Valve has the rare luxury of not having to release games to stay alive, so they can wait until they have a title that they are proud of and confident in.

so IMO if Valve announces a big budget title it's automatically worth taking note of, which can't be said for almost any other company out there.

they might have a disappointingly low output but that's not necessarily a bad thing

Yes but we aren’t talking about a new game in a vacuum. They started a series over 20 years ago and won’t finish it. They disappoint me, same as George RR Martin, but in his case I wouldn’t even bother if those books do ever come out.

 

[nial]

I'd say Rare because in the 360 era i still believed they were a really special studio. Sea of Thieves was kind of a miracle but it seems they went into dev hell mode again for Everwild. And anyway Everwild always looked like shit to me, nothing to do with Rare.

Rareware is weird to me. The Donkey Kong Country trilogy are some of my favorite games ever, but the rest of its output never interested me that much. Sea of Thieves Rare feels like a completely different studio, nothing to do with its DKC era and doesn't appeal to me one bit.

 

[JayK47]

Valve is essentially no longer a developer. Alex would count if I didn't need $10,000 worth of PC and VR gear to play it.

Bioware doesn't have anybody there anymore who knows how to make a decent game. I doubt they will make a comeback.

Other developers, like Rockstar, take so long to make a game, the game can't live up to the hype. They focus too much on online gaming now.

 

[DonkeyPunchJr]

Maxis was pretty sad too. The tech for Spore was absolutely amazing but they turned it into a boring game. Sim City is broken and dumb. Now they basically just crank out Sims trash.

 

[Henry Panic]

Like a lot of studios nowadays Bioware is just a name.

I'd say Rare because in the 360 era i still believed they were a really special studio. Sea of Thieves was kind of a miracle but it seems they went into dev hell mode again for Everwild. And anyway Everwild always looked like shit to me, nothing to do with Rare.

Problem is no one including Rare knows what Everwild was supposed to be, so we really can't judge...nothing.

 

[Spaceman292]

Yes lol

 

[Madflavor]

Yup. I'll never forget how they ruined one of the greatest sci-fi universes ever created with that amateur hour unforgivable ending to ME3. DAI was alright, but for the most part they've sucked ass since. One could argue the problems began with DA2, or even further back than that, but really ME3 was the first of their games that pissed a lot of fans off. Andromeda and Anthem were the games that truly showed that not they lost a lot of their talent, and their management was horrible.

So far we've yet to see anything of substance with DA4. We know for a fact it's gone through multiple massive reworks, but the fact that it's almost 2023 and we still haven't seen anything on it leads me to believe they're having the same old management problems. Truth be told Bioware used to be my favorite devs, now they're barely on my radar.

 

[Ben87fr]

I'd say it's because the people that made the great/good games like kotor, jade empire, mass effect are just gone, it's just not the bioware we knew, it's an imitation, like in The Thing you know ? You think they are still the same but really it's become a horrible monster

 

[EverydayBeast]

Andromeda never got going.

 

[Aaron Olive]

It's a tie between them and blizzard.

And 343i

 

[thuGG_pl]

I think Blizzard takes the crown.

 

[oji-san]

I enjoyed Andromeda, but yeah previous games were better. Never played any of their other games except the Mass Effect series so i can't really judge.

 

[Quasicat]

The only thing BioWare has done in the past 10 years that excites me was a remaster of a trilogy.

Then came the question: Is it coming to Switch, and then the excitement was lost.

 

[Drizzlehell]

Maybe if they didn't have to deal with all the crybabies complaining about ME3's ending, their management wouldn't give up and straight up left the company, leaving it in a state of complete disarray that resulted in a series of duds.

Inquisition wasn't THAT bad, though. It was just kinda bloated with pointless fetch quests and none of the choices you made in it mattered. But the story and characters and exploration/combat were still pretty fun.

 

[Bitmap Frogs]

Like a lot of studios nowadays Bioware is just a name.

I'd say Rare because in the 360 era i still believed they were a really special studio. Sea of Thieves was kind of a miracle but it seems they went into dev hell mode again for Everwild. And anyway Everwild always looked like shit to me, nothing to do with Rare.

Viva Piñata was based as fuck.

Unfortunately it didn’t involve aiming down sights and it released in the shootiest console ever.

So it crashed and burned, undeservedly so.

 

[MrKainobi]

It’s EA and just shows again how bad they are at managing their assets in a sustainable way. I’m sure they made their short term gains, now it’s time to bring Bioware to the backyard and jump on another horse.

 

[winjer]

Dice also has been lacking in the last decade. But Bioware is much worse.
Rockstar has also been a bit shit.
But like most have pointed out, Blizzard is the worst.

 

[kungfuian]

It's almost like big soulless companies buying up creative companies doesn't work, and that given enough time all the talent will leave and you end up with a name and IP only. Then with no one to make the good games the legacy IP and name also go to shit, and in the end you shut it down and end up owning nothing. Great business model.

That's why I'm all for Microsoft's acquisition of ACTI, one giant soulless company buying another giant soulless company is a better fit, no creativity is at risk, and at least they won't be buying up and destroying otherwise creative studios. It's too bad so much of EA's value is in licensed IP, otherwise they would be perfect for Microsoft too.

 

[-Zelda-]

I hope Jade Empire comes to the Switch and PS5 at some point. Especially the PS5 where I can stream it to youtube.