Electronic Arts is shutting down BioWare and has stopped development of Mass Effect 5, according to ifun.de. The publisher announced the decision in an open letter to staff, and the studio's Edmonton location is being closed. The move comes as part of a wider restructuring at EA that will eliminate roughly 400 positions, about 50 of them at BioWare.
The cancelled project was the fifth main entry in the Mass Effect role-playing series, which fans had been waiting for since it was first announced in 2020. According to ifun.de, only a small number of employees were still actively working on the game at the time of the decision. The site reports that EA has not said whether the franchise might later be handed to a different studio, leaving the series' future unclear.
Why it matters
BioWare was founded in 1995 and built its reputation on role-playing games that became reference points for the genre, among them Baldur's Gate, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic and Neverwinter Nights. EA acquired the studio in early 2008 and went on to release the Dragon Age and Mass Effect series, both of which became major commercial properties for the publisher.
The closure ends a three-decade run and removes one of the industry's best-known RPG houses from EA's lineup. For players, it means the Mass Effect story will not continue in the near term. For EA, it marks the loss of a studio whose name carried weight with a dedicated audience, even as its recent output struggled to match that legacy.
A run of setbacks
The studio's standing had weakened over the past decade. Mass Effect: Andromeda and the online role-playing game Anthem both failed to reproduce earlier successes, with Anthem in particular described by ifun.de as a resounding failure. Dragon Age: The Veilguard drew positive reviews but fell well short of commercial expectations. BioWare had already been scaled back in 2025 before this final closure.
The restructuring follows EA's takeover by Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund, according to ifun.de. The publisher is cutting around 400 roles across the company, with the BioWare reductions forming a small part of that total. The reporting does not detail which other teams or departments are affected.
What to watch
Whether EA places the Mass Effect property with another developer remains an open question, and no timeline has been given. For now, the series has no announced continuation, and BioWare's Edmonton office is closing its doors.
