Rumor: Shadow Realms Overhauled, Gets Full Campaign and Origin Integration

Citing sources familiar with the inner workings at EA, Kotaku penned a full report that claims Shadow Realms, BioWare Austin’s 4vs1 online action-RPG, is currently going through a development overhaul. According to the report, BioWare’s decision to integrate Origin’s services resulted in a budget increase, and as a consequence the developers decided to implement a full campaign. The game is now apparently slated for a 2017 release, on PC and also on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One. While BioWare originally only announced a PC release, this shouldn’t really surprise anyone, as they also made clear in the past that they never really intended to make the title a PC exclusive.

A snippet from the report:

But things have changed. Two industry sources say they heard Shadow Realms was cancelled, but a third, reliable source familiar with goings-on at BioWare Austin says the game was overhauled in late October and will now have a full campaign. Though some details may be in flux, early plans for Shadow Realms now peg it as a 2017 release for PS4, Xbox One, and PC, according to that source.

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So what happened? According to one source, BioWare decided to reboot the game, coinciding with their decision to embrace the integration of EA’s digital store and online service, Origin. Developers at EA take budget hits if they don’t use internal technology and services, according to multiple people who have worked for the company. When the developers behind some of EA’s recent online games, like Dawngate and Command & Conquer, didn’t integrate Origin, those games’ budgets were limited, which may have been a factor in their ultimate cancellations.