Another week goes by with news of another veteran of EA's BioWare moving to Wizards of the Coasts' newly-revealed Archetype games studio.
Though he has just unveiled that he has moved to the studio, Drew Karpyshyn appears to have joined the outfit in May 2019 as narrative director and lead writer, per his LinkedIn. This follows a 15-month stint at Fogbank Entertainment and an 18-year-plus run at BioWare. There he worked on titles including Knights of the Old Republic and the first two Mass Effect titles.
"I’m proud to announce that I’m the lead writer for Archetype Entertainment! Founded by James Ohlen – the creative genius behind BioWare hits like Baldur’s Gate, KOTOR and Dragon Age – Archetype is a new video game studio under the Wizards of the Coast umbrella… and I haven’t been this excited to work on a project in a long, long time! (Side note: I’ve always enjoyed working with WotC; they even published my first novel!)," Karpyshyn wrote.
"I’ve been in the video game industry for twenty years now. When I started at BioWare, everything was fresh and exciting. It was a dream job – talented people working together to create epic games like Baldur’s Gate, KOTOR, Mass Effect and Dragon Age. But as we grew and became more successful, things changed. We became more corporate. We were less able to make what we loved, and the teams were pushed to create games based on market research rather than our creative instincts and passions. My dream job became just a job, and I lost the enthusiasm and excitement I once had.
"But with Archetype, my passion has been rekindled. The feel in the studio reminds me of my early days at BioWare; I can feel the magic in the air. And even though I can’t get too deep into the specifics of what we’re working on yet, we’re already generating plenty of excitement in the industry."
Wizards of the Coast hired BioWare vet James Ohlen in 2019, with the firm revealing that this was to head up a new games studio called Archetype earlier in February.
