EA’s greed causing move from single-player: Ex-BioWare dev

EA’s greed is the reason the publisher is moving away from single-player games, says ex-BioWare dev, Manveer Heir.

Heir, who worked on Mass Effect 3 and Mass Effect: Andromeda, says open-world games bring in more cash.

“They [EA] are generally pushing for more open-world games,” he said, speaking with the Waypoint podcast. “And the reason is you can monetise them better.

“Why do you care about that at EA? The reason you care about that is because microtransactions: buying card packs in the Mass Effect games, the multiplayer. It’s the same reason we added card packs to Mass Effect 3: how do you get people to keep coming back to a thing instead of ‘just’ playing for 60 to 100 hours?”

Heir concluded by saying that “publishers in general only care about the highest return on investment.”

He added that EA decided to add multiplayer microtransaction systems in Andromeda and Dragon Age: Inquisition because they proved so successful in Mass Effect 3.

“I’ve seen people literally spend $15,000 on Mass Effect multiplayer cards,” Heir said.

Last week, EA closed Dead Space studio Visceral Games and announced it will shift the focus of its single-player Star Wars title to an open-world setting.