Lead: The EA BioWare closure is official: Electronic Arts is shutting down BioWare, the studio behind Mass Effect and Dragon Age, and ending early development on the next Mass Effect game as part of roughly 400 layoffs announced on October 21.
What happened with the EA BioWare closure
BioWare confirmed the news in a statement posted to social media on Wednesday, October 21. The studio said it is closing after more than three decades and that “early development on the next Mass Effect project is ending.”
The same day, EA chief operating officer David Tinson and chief studios officer Cam Weber sent a letter to staff explaining that the company had “taken a hard look at our business” over recent months. Gematsu published the letter in full. According to Bloomberg, as cited by both Gematsu and VGC, about 400 people will lose their jobs, roughly 3% of EA’s workforce, including around 50 at BioWare.
BioWare was not the only casualty. Gematsu reports that a new Sims project code-named Project Lotus was cancelled, while a separate project code-named Project Evergreen continues. The free-to-play skate. stays in development with a smaller team, and VGC says “many” staff are gone from its developer, Full Circle.
EA says it will keep investing in sports games, Apex Legends, Battlefield, the next Star Wars Jedi game, and a new Marvel’s Iron Man title. It also confirmed that Respawn and DICE are collaborating on a new project.
BioWare was founded in 1995 by Ray Muzyka and Greg Zeschuk and acquired by EA in 2007. Its most recent release was Dragon Age: The Veilguard in 2024.
Why it matters
This is the end of one of the most important RPG studios in Western gaming. Baldur’s Gate, Neverwinter Nights, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Dragon Age, and Mass Effect shaped how a generation thinks about party members, dialogue wheels, and choices that carry over between games. Plenty of today’s RPG designers learned the craft by playing them.
The business context is hard to ignore. VGC notes the closure lands about two months after EA completed its $55 billion leveraged buyout led by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, which took the company private and left it carrying around $18 billion in debt. EA had already told investors it planned to cut $700 million in annual costs. Read alongside the staff letter, the message is clear: money is moving toward live-service and sports franchises, and away from slow, expensive single-player RPGs.
For fans, the sting is Mass Effect. The next entry was teased in 2020 and had shown almost nothing since. It is now cancelled before it ever got a real reveal. The rights to Mass Effect and Dragon Age stay with EA, so the series are dormant rather than dead, but there is no studio left whose job is to make them.
There is one small thread left. IGN reports, citing sources at Prime Video, that the Mass Effect TV series is still in development at Amazon MGM Studios with its creative team intact.
What we know vs what is rumored
- Confirmed: BioWare is closing, and early development on the next Mass Effect has ended, per BioWare’s own statement.
- Confirmed: EA will focus on sports, Apex Legends, Battlefield, Star Wars Jedi, Marvel’s Iron Man, and a Respawn and DICE collaboration.
- Reported, not officially itemized by EA: about 400 layoffs, including around 50 at BioWare, and the cancellation of Sims Project Lotus (Bloomberg, via Gematsu and VGC).
- Unconfirmed: that the Respawn and DICE project is Star Wars: Battlefront III. Bloomberg says it is likely, and Variety cites unnamed sources; EA has not named it.
- Unconfirmed: any sale of the Mass Effect or Dragon Age rights. Former BioWare executive producer Mark Darrah has suggested a sale is now more likely, as reported by IGN, but EA has said nothing.
What happens next
EA has not given a final closing date for BioWare’s offices or details on severance. Watch for official word on what happens to the Mass Effect and Dragon Age IP, any formal reveal of the Respawn and DICE project, and whether Prime Video’s Mass Effect series keeps moving toward production without a games studio behind it.
Sources: Gematsu — Electronic Arts to lay off 400 staff, shut down BioWare; VGC — EA is closing BioWare and cancelling the next Mass Effect; IGN — Mass Effect TV Series Remains Active at Prime Video Despite BioWare Closure; IGN — Former BioWare Executive Producer Mark Darrah Says EA Might Be More Likely to Sell IPs