After EA’s announcement this week, PC Gamer reached out to BioWare veteran David Gaider to ask for his reflection on the closure and his memories of the studio. Gaider joined BioWare in 1999 to work on Baldur’s Gate 2: Shadows of Amn and went on to be lead writer on the early Dragon Age games, leaving BioWare in 2016 and co-founding Summerfall Studios in 2019.
Gaider on BioWare
My main feeling regarding the BioWare closure is one of sadness—more than I expected to feel after having been away from the company for almost 10 years now, actually. At its height, no other studio in the world did it better, and its influence on the gaming world is undeniable. Honestly, it felt more like an institution than just another company, so to see it shuttered so unceremoniously… it hit hard, despite being predictable (considering the current climate in the industry).
My fondest memory will always be right after the release of Baldur’s Gate II: Shadows of Amn in September of 2000. We’d scrambled to put out the game, cut so much out of it just to make it work and, even then, knew there were still so many bugs we couldn’t get to. So we were nervous, worried that the fans would see all those cuts and hate it.
The very next day, everyone was running between the offices reading out loud the forum posts from fans who were simply over the moon at what they were finding. We read out the glowing reviews, the love that was being given to the narrative team, and the declarations that this game put BioWare on the map. Let’s just say there were a lot of tears. It was my first job in the industry and my first game release, and I had no idea what to expect. I think I knew that day, bathing in the collective relief and the giddiness of all that fan love, that I would indeed be doing this for the rest of my life.
(Image credit: BioWare)
The loss of a legacy hurts
As Gaider says, this closure isn’t a massive surprise. Anyone paying attention—including BioWare’s former boss and also plenty of its staff—suspected that EA’s new owners wouldn’t hesitate to cut the studio loose. Damn it does hurt though. BioWare was a pillar of RPG development. Its success with those early Baldur’s Gate games is what would eventually lead to Larian’s Baldur’s Gate 3, and The Witcher studio CD Projekt Red has shouted out BioWare’s impact on CRPG development. David Gaider led the team creating the games that made me personally realize I could enter this industry as a career. It’s rough to see that history get binned.
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