It is no secret anymore that Dragon Age: The Veilguard was not up to AAA expectations, even its director has resigned from BioWare. The other hope for BioWare’s comeback, however, is Mass Effect 5 and it’s not exactly coming any time soon in the next few years or so. That’s because a BioWare veteran has explained what’s going on in the studio and how it’s slowing down after Dragon Age: The Veilguard.
Mark Darrah is the executive producer of Dragon Age in BioWare and he recently uploaded a video on his YouTube account to lay out the studio’s work and development process. It’s a rather long discussion but one segment in the video details how BioWare poured all of its efforts into Dragon Age: The Veilguard to help it ship faster, meaning the Mass Effect 5 team was put on pause for more than a year.
Mass Effect 5 isn’t Ready
Effectively, it means Mass Effect 5 hasn’t exactly entered its production stage yet. In fact, during the duration of Dragon Age: The Veilguard‘s development, Mass Effect 5 “ceased to exist.” BioWare is thus tackling one AAA project at a time, supposedly in order to produce games at their ideal state, which was evident in Dragon Age: The Veilguard‘s level of polish.
“BioWare is figuring out that it simply can’t do more than one project at a time. There is power in admitting what you’re doing and it’s a lot safer to not allow a project to run without leadership,” explains Mark Darrah.
Here’s the full explanation below for those interested in Mark Darrah’s full explanation.
Now that Dragon Age: The Veilguard has shipped, Darrah further reveals that there’s still a bit more work to be done for the game before all efforts move on to Mass Effect 5. Admittedly, Dragon Age: The Veilguard devs apparently still have some cleaning up to do, especially with the final patches.
After that, it’s on to Mass Effect 5 since there’s no plan for DLCs for Dragon Age. Still, Darrah tempers everyone’s expectations; Mass Effect 5 isn’t ready for a huge team just yet and BioWare is still in the process of shuffling people around in EA. Do expect hints or teasers in the next two years.
