BioWare: EA doesn't tell us what to do

[Joelcool7]

I was very much aware that BioWare still had a lot of autonomy. Talking to the developers and noticing the studio retained its BioWare name, many studios EA buys are called EA studios, in fact BioWare has expanded creating several new studios yet they are all called BioWare and not EA studios. A huge thing I found when contacting EACanada in Vancouver when I was reporting is they almost always sent me to BioWare themselves for interviews and facts about upcoming BioWare titles. Many other publishers want to answer your questions they don't often send you to the actual studio, it takes a lot of time and effort to actually get a hold of a studio. But in BioWare's case EA is proud of them, they are their golden goose and EA doesn't want to interfere or do anything to stifle their success.

Fact is BioWare was a great AAA+ class game developer before EA took them over, they remain an AAA+ class studio after EA took them over. Mainly because EA didn't take complete control over everything. They allowed BioWare to evolve and grow and create great content, the only difference is now EA gets all the profits and gets to ensure all of BioWare's products are exclusive to EA.

Imagine how successful other publishers could be if they followed this model? When buying a successful studio just sitting back and letting the studio do their job. Its a great philosophy , sure if the studios quality drops to shit and the company begins to bleed money then maybe its time to step in and micro manage. But if all the publishers just sat back and let their acquired studios continue to make products as they pleased their wouldn't be nearly as many problems.

Look at Rare as perfect example or even Bungie. Microsoft is horrible with this, they want to micro-manage everything. They buy a studio and they want to change the studio and influence every product they make. Rare staff was pissed off and Microsoft scared most of them away their controlling policy lead to a loss of most of the staff, leaving just Rare's intellectual properties which Microsoft did a horrible job of utilizing. Then look at Bungie, Microsoft took over at first they let Bungie have alot of freedom and let the studio work freely but soon they moved in to micro-manage as they did with Rare. Ordering products be developed or cancelled, I remember when Bill Gates announced Halo3 and apparently Bungie was working on an entirely different game at the time. They had to scrap the other game and create Halo 3 from scratch with Microsoft riding them for a specific launch date. Several Bungie employees high up and within the ranks of the company left upset with Microsoft's controlling style. Luckily Bungie went independent if Microsoft had continued to stifle them and control everything they did then they might not have remained the great studio they will continue to be and used to be. In fact 343 is a much better idea, creating a studio dedicated to a single franchise, but even 343 higher ups have talked about not being able to do anything freely they are very much Microsoft's bitch. Game developers need a lot of freedom to create a quality product, they need to be invested both financially, physically and mentally!

Look at other studio acquisitions you'll note in cases where the publisher interfered to much they lost quality staff. In most cases the studios over all game quality dropped and the value of the studio did also. EA has done a great job encouraging its studios to maintain their greatness without stifling it like Microsoft or even Activision are very well known for. In fact EA used to be known for similar practices luckily they changed that around and now are one of the best acquisition models of any publisher!