These days, BioWare is barely a shadow of its former self. Anthem proved a massive failure, though the studio is now investing in overhauling it. Before that, Mass Effect: Andromeda was pretty much catastrophic, with single-player support ending a few months after release. The last truly great BioWare game, arguably, was Mass Effect 2, though some would say Dragon Age: Origins instead. BioWare left a void that a lot of RPG developers attempt to fill. Spiders, the developer of upcoming open-world action RPG GreedFall, is one of those developers.
In an exclusive interview with The Escapist, Spiders CEO Jehanne Rousseau talked about the game and the studio’s ambitions for it. Spiders isn’t a big studio, and it has a much smaller team and budget than BioWare did at its prime. For comparison, according to Wikipedia, BioWare had over 800 employees back in 2010, when Mass Effect 2 launched. According to Rousseau, the GreedFall development team expanded from 35 to 50 in its three years of development. That’s one of the reasons why the game has a more average length compared to other open-world RPGs.
GreedFall: quality over quantity
Still, Rousseau understands that there is a void left by BioWare and that it’s possible to fill it. She clarifies that Spiders won’t really “replace” BioWare, but players who are looking for story-driven RPGs in that tradition might enjoy GreedFall. Although the game isn’t fully open-world, it does feature fairly expansive zones, which probably allows for better plot pacing and character development. You can find out more about the game and Spiders in The Escapist’s full exclusive interview.
GreedFall will release on Sept 10 for PC via Steam, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. You can already preorder from those platforms and also from the official website.
Do you think Spiders will be able to provide an action RPG to match BioWare’s prime? Will BioWare ever recover from its creative rut? Leave your comments below!
Published: Aug 13, 2019 05:00 pm