Has EA Delayed Production On Dragon Age III?
Electronic Arts has just released some numbers for their financial earnings, and they weren’t exactly looking too great. With the release they’ve announced that they’ve delayed a “key game” from the 13th to 14th fiscal year. In other words, they have stopped a game from releasing by March 31st 2013, and delayed it to release some time after.
What exactly could this “key game” be? Michael Pachter, a well-known financial analyst, assumes that it could be Dragon Age III, and he’s got a compelling theory as to why. His idea is that the game was delayed so that developers working on Dragon Age III could head over to provide help with Star Wars: The Old Republic. This theory makes some sense, as EA announced that the subscriber base in the new MMO has dropped. Players seem to want more content, therefore BioWare is working to make that happen.
Pachter had this to say about his assumption:
“When we spoke with the [EA] CEO, he added the color that the game was expected to slip because the team had been pulled away to work on another important project. While we don’t know what the game is, the only game that makes sense is Dragon Age 3, as it is developed by BioWare, the same studio that produced the Star Wars MMO. It seems obvious to us that the BioWare team responsible for Dragon Age 3 was asked to place development of that game on hold and work on Star Wars, to ensure that the latter game launched before the holidays.”
We can’t say for sure that Pachter’s theory is solid, but it makes a lot of sense. With BioWare working to bring their SWTOR subscriber base back up, and with fans ringing in their complaints with Dragon Age II, this delay could be a win-win situation for the company. We haven’t gotten official word from BioWare on this yet, but as soon as it comes we’ll have an update. Who knows, maybe this is what the Dragon Age series needs right now?
