Mass Effect 3 Hatred weighed heavily on franchise creators

Bioware’s co-founders recently announced their departure from the video game industry.  After a long run of hit titles with the Mass Effect and Dragon Age franchises, Ray Muzyka and Greg Zeschuk pointed to personal reasons as to how the two came to the decision.  Although recently, an ex-Bioware founder and creator of Baldur’s Gate explained that he spoke with Zeschuk prior to the departure and fan negativity played a huge role in his decision.

“The last time I met up with Greg, I felt his exhaustion,” Trent Oster revealed in a recent interview.  “I think the Mass Effect 3 fan reaction and the Old Republic fans negativity was just too much… You have to love games and you put your heart into them to create them.  To have the fans creating petitions against the work is pretty hard to take, especially when you’ve spent the last few years crunching overtime to try and ship a game.  It can be hard to shut off the overwhelming negativity the internet spews forth, especially when it has your name or the name of your company in it.”

The recent departure of the Bioware executives came as a shock to many in the gaming industry, but Bioware will indeed live on as an EA company, which the developer outlined in a recent statement.  The company outlined more from the Mass Effect franchise, and the announcement of Dragon Age III.

Ray Muzyka responded to the comments in the interview by issuing some clarification.  “I respect/revere fans, because they speak with deep, honest passion.  Journalists speculating on ill-founded rumors should reassess approach.”  While he didn’t come right out and say it, it doesn’t look like Muzyka agrees with the speculation that the interview with Oster generated.