Shadow Realms abruptly cancelled by BioWare

Remember Shadow Realms, the rather confusing 4v1 episodic RPG multiplayer online game revealed by BioWare Austin at last year’s GamesCom? Well, now it’s cancelled.

A blog post titled ‘An Important Update’ at the Shadow Realms site delivers the news. This reinforces my view that ‘An Important Update’ is the gaming equivalent of your partner saying “We need to talk …” and motioning towards some suitcases on the stairs.

Reading between the lines, it sounds like the title just wasn’t coming together as planned. There isn’t really a reason given for the cancellation, other than “right now there are other projects for the team to work on within the BioWare studios for the coming year and beyond.” Which, presumably, was also true before this game was axed.

Good job they spent all that money on those lavish, live-action teaser trailers before the reveal, eh?

It sounds like the Shadow Realms Austin team will be moving on to creating bits and pieces for Dragon Age: Inquisition, the new Mass Effect title that’s in development or Star Wars: The Old Republic (it’s indicated that some sort of movie tie-in activities will be happening there.)

BioWare Austin’s Jeff Hickman thanks everybody who offered their views about the title, and signs off by saying that he’s working on a way of thanking the players who signed up for closed alpha sessions.