Mark Darrah, former executive producer at BioWare, has shared new insights into the turbulent early development of Anthem, shedding light on key internal decisions, EA’s push toward live-service models, and the disjointed creative process that plagued the project long before its public debut. The retrospective, which comes from a video posted by Darrah, covers the period before he officially joined the Anthem team in late 2017, offering a candid account of the game’s conception and the corporate climate surrounding it.
According to Darrah, the concept for Anthem—then operating under the codename “Dylan”—emerged in the aftermath of Mass Effect 3. Following that game’s release, the leadership behind the Mass Effect series sought new opportunities, leaving the franchise to BioWare Montreal. At the same time, EA was embracing a new internal philosophy: the belief that single-player games were on the decline, and that live-service titles represented the future. This context informed the pitch behind Dylan, a multiplayer-focused project spearheaded by Casey Hudson that aimed to revolutionize story-driven cooperative play.
EA was reportedly captivated by Hudson’s proposal, interpreting it as a chance to merge BioWare’s storytelling with the kind of commercial success typically seen with sports titles like FIFA. However, Darrah claims the pitch was more conceptual than practical. Despite Hudson’s confidence, there was little clarity among the team regarding what Dylan was actually meant to be, and the absence of a clearly defined vision quickly became an obstacle.
Complicating matters further was a disconnect between Dylan’s leadership and the rest of the studio. An internal video describing traditional BioWare development methods as outdated reportedly failed to resonate with staff who had just completed Dragon Age: Inquisition and Mass Effect: Andromeda. Secrecy surrounding the project was another concern, with locked presentations and highly selective meetings contributing to confusion and isolation within the broader studio.
Darrah also speculates that Casey Hudson’s departure from BioWare in 2014 may have stemmed from resource constraints, as the studio was prioritizing Inquisition and Andromeda. In his absence, the Dylan project lacked central leadership, and comparisons to other looter shooters—such as Destiny or Borderlands—were actively discouraged, which further hindered the team’s ability to define the game’s identity.
A critical juncture came in 2016, when BioWare and EA debated whether to continue work on “Joplin,” the early version of Dragon Age 4, or reassign the team to assist with Anthem. Despite Darrah’s argument that Joplin was more clearly structured, the decision ultimately favored Anthem, with some attributing the outcome to Hudson’s lingering influence within EA’s leadership.
As development stalled, frustrations grew across both BioWare and EA. A supervised demo reviewed by EA executive Patrick Soderlund—at a time when flying had not yet been implemented—received significant criticism, and BioWare’s reliance on outside teams like DICE for technical support further strained internal relationships. Meanwhile, inconsistencies in the project’s scope and direction became apparent. EA initially approved a design document claiming there would be six Javelin suits, but when the number was reduced to four to match a clearer gameplay structure, the change was viewed by EA leadership as a critical misstep. In response, Darrah creatively reframed the suit classes, stating each Javelin would have two subtypes—thus increasing the count from six to eight and appeasing executive concerns. He now advises against using fixed numbers in public or internal pitches for this very reason.
The game’s name was another point of contention. The team initially preferred “Javelins,” which EA rejected for being too narrow. They then proposed “Beyond,” only to find that the name was already trademarked by Sony. In the end, they settled on “Anthem,” a title Darrah admits had little relevance to the game’s narrative or setting but was not considered a fatal flaw. He points out that Dragon Age also did not feature dragons when the name was chosen.
Darrah concludes by reflecting on EA’s marketing approach. He believes that while the company typically struggles to market RPGs, the team behind Anthem had a rare understanding of how to position the game, likely due to its alignment with genres EA was more familiar with, such as shooters and sports titles. In contrast, Dragon Age was seen through a different lens. EA reportedly hoped to turn it into a “billion-dollar franchise,” which may have contributed to their decision to repurpose the Dragon Age team for Anthem and to reframe the next Dragon Age as a live-service game. Darrah remains unsure whether the live-service mandate was genuine or simply a strategic justification for delaying Joplin.
