I've always liked Bioware, and still do.  Opinion hasn't changed :D!

Originally posted by Eliandal

  I've always liked Bioware, and still do.  Opinion hasn't changed :D!

Well it is a tricky question, for me. Because I don't feel they did a good job on the MMOG part but I still think they are excellent in creating single player, story driven RPGs.

First DA2, then SWTOR, then the ME3 butchering for the sake of extra sales...

No, BW are not riding high on my fave devs right now.

It wasn't THAT long ago I was proud to say Iliked them as well.

Originally posted by Vesavius

First DA2, then SWTOR, then the ME3 butchering for the sake of extra sales...

No, BW are not riding high on my fave devs right now.

It wasn't THAT long ago I was proud to say Iliked them as well.

True after the Baldur's Gate series and Dragon Age Origins 1 I thought they were one of the best gaming dev companies around. More focused on creating good games rather than just making profit. Lately I feel they have gone the "profit at all costs" route.

I liked them more when guys like Rob Bartel, Jay Watamaniuk, Derek French and the rest of the "Live Team" frequented the forums and were directly involved with the community concerning the products they were working on, especially Neverwinter Nights. 

Lately, they just seem like a bunch of arrogants with a "we can do no wrong and always know the best" attitude. 

Originally posted by tuppe99

I liked them more when guys like Rob Bartel, Jay Watamaniuk, Derek French and the rest of the "Live Team" frequented the forums and were directly involved with the community concerning the products they were working on, especially Neverwinter Nights. 

...

Same here. I was a Bioware fan during their Baldurs Gate and Neverwinter Night years.

From there, however, the founders of Bioware (commonly known as the doctors and now bigwigs at EA) led Bioware ever more into the shooter/action/console/cinematics/watch-a-slightly-interactive-movie style of gameplay. I believe they had commercial success with that but that gameplay isn't my personal preference thus I didn't play Bioware games any more.

Bioware didn't make a single fantasy title between NWN and Dragon's Age (what was it, for 8 years?) and when I bought Dragon's Age Origins I thought that it showed: they didn't have any competent gameplay designers for those titles any more. Now their competence is about telling a story like in a Hollywood movie, making cutscenes and having virtual romances with NPC henchmen. Well, not exactly my cup of tea. But enough people seem to like these things.

I didn't buy SWToR and didn't vote on the poll. From what I've read there's nothing in SWToR that would fit my gaming habits. :)

SW:TOR is a massive failure... to me.

But Bioware's last straw for me as a company? Day 1 DLC for Mass Effect 3.

I'm done.  I can't take this shit anymore.

My feelings as Bioware downgraded by EA to a money making second rate developer after Dragon Age 2 has now been confirmed.

On the other hand I never really was a fan of them to begin with. I found the story, plot, world and characters in Mass effect 1 and 2 bland and uniteresting.

Good Poll.  Bioware's name on this MMO was one of the reasons why I thought this game was going to be an overwhelming sucess.  Its not a horrible game, but its not as good as I dreamed/thought is was going to be.  Sad Panda.

Originally posted by Yamota

Originally posted by Vesavius

First DA2, then SWTOR, then the ME3 butchering for the sake of extra sales...

No, BW are not riding high on my fave devs right now.

It wasn't THAT long ago I was proud to say Iliked them as well.

True after the Baldur's Gate series and Dragon Age Origins 1 I thought they were one of the best gaming dev companies around. More focused on creating good games rather than just making profit. Lately I feel they have gone the "profit at all costs" route.

Exactly.

The had sooooo much goodwill from the public a while back... corperations out there would have paid millions for the general love and positive public image BW had, and indeed EA tried to. But... instead of valuing it, building on it, and justifying it they chose to cash in on it.

Tragic really.

Not really.  Between the fact I haven't enjoyed any of their titles since the 90's (no scripted, voice acted RPG content isn't what I'm looking for, even in single player titles) and that they've been absorbed by EA and it's heavy hand is clearly evident in the creation of SWTOR I think my viewpoint remains unchanged.

They built exactly the sort of MMORPG that I expected them to.

bioware knows how to create a good game but definitely has no idea what mmo stands for.

Double

Originally posted by tuppe99

I liked them more when guys like Rob Bartel, Jay Watamaniuk, Derek French and the rest of the "Live Team" frequented the forums and were directly involved with the community concerning the products they were working on, especially Neverwinter Nights. 

Lately, they just seem like a bunch of arrogants with a "we can do no wrong and always know the best" attitude. 

I've gotten this vibe from them as well, especially through their arrogance when promoting TOR for all those months, declaring that they knew what MMOs gamers wanted, what the genre needed, how they were the only ones to deliver it. Like they were the saviors of the genre or something. That characterization might be a little bit hyperbolic, but not by much. I tired of seeing tooting their own horn in interviews and basically stopped reading them in the final stretch before launch.

That kind of arrogance and hubris, especially coming from a developer entering the MMO arena and stepping outside their comfort zone for the first time, is always distasteful and unwarranted in my eyes. It definitely decreased my regard for them as a developer.

There would have been nothing wrong with them saying "we're doing our best to make the best and most enjoyable Star Wars MMO we can, and we have some awesome ideas that we think people are really going to like and will set us apart from our competitors. Here's a list of some of the major features we're implementing. We're excited about people finally getting to check it out", and leaving it at that.

Alas, they opted to dial the ego meter up to 11.

Originally posted by Larsa

I didn't buy SWToR and didn't vote on the poll. From what I've read there's nothing in SWToR that would fit my gaming habits. :)

I did not buy SWTOR either. I was in t he beta and it just took me to level 17 to realise that this is indeed a very poorly made MMO. So, the last game I bought from them was Dragon Age 1 and I have a feeling that it will remain that way.

As mmo go, it is good SWtor. But still lacking..

How ever as a company, it is unchanged for me..

Ktor1, ME-series, Dragon Age and so on.. Nuff said

AFTER swtor...after!

Maybe it is BW or maybe it is EA 's fault but they delivered a below than mediocre game. Actually not even an mmorpg, if i could find a term to describe the game it would go as a "Single No Pvp No Interaction With Other Beings Desert Like Mediocre Game RPG".

Yes i played the game.

Yes WoW IS better as far as MMOs go and that says alot for TOR's quality.

Bioware, after this huge blunder will think thrice about what ppl expect from an mmorpg, oh ....wait, i will tell them so they can save time and money....they expect an MMORPG!!! DAH....

I'm never going to buy any of their games again, heck in my opinion they owe me for a CE of swtor, I bought a mmo, so I thought, and got some weird "not a singleplayer / not a mmo" product, probably the worst "mmo" I've ever tried, honestly, it makes WoW seem great.

The only way I'll ever play a Bioware game again, is if I pirated 1 (well they owe me for 2), but I'm against software piracy, so I'll never touch one again...

Heck I'll buy a SOE mmo before I touch anything with Bioware written on it,