Mass Effect and Dragon Age leads announce departure from BioWare

Two prominent figures from legendary RPG studio BioWare are leaving the company. Mark Darrah and Casey Hudson have shared their decision via blog posts on the official BioWare website.

Casey Hudson is arguably the more well-known name. He was the project director for the original Mass Effect trilogy. Hence, it’s understandable just how much he means for the success of the iconic space-RPG.

Interestingly enough, this isn’t the first time Hudson left BioWare. A few years after Mass Effect 3’s launch, he left the company the first time. Only for him to return in 2017. This time, as the role of general manager.

Mark Darrah on the other hand is a true fantasy-RPG veteran. Darrah has been with BioWare for over 23 years. During this time, he worked on RPG giants like Baldur’s Gate. But his biggest work is without a doubt the Dragon Age franchise. Here, Darrah acted as execute producer for all entries. Even the new one, Dragon Age 4.

Seeing how influential and important Casey Hudson and Mark Darrah were for BioWare tent pole RPG franchises, their departure is met with mixed emotions. Mainly because the studio’s recent Anthem and Mass Effect Andromeda utterly failed to impress.

What does this mean for the future of Mass Effect and Dragon Age though? EA’s Chief Studios Officer Laura Miele also penned a post on the BioWare blog where she addressed the departures. Miele reassures fans that development on the next Mass Effect and Dragon Age 4 is continuing as planned.

Furthermore, we also learn that Samantha Ryan is the new GM of BioWare. And Blizzard alumni Christian Dailey is taking over the Dargon Age 4 project.

It’ll be interesting to see how BioWare will handle the next installments of their premier IPs. We know that it’s still early days for Mass Effect but Dragon Age 4 has been in the oven for quite a while now.