Anthem director Jonathan Warner leaves BioWare

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"BioWare has been home to my grateful heart for nearly ten years"

Anthem
(Image credit: EA)

Jonathan Warner has left BioWare after ten years at the studio.

The news comes just a few weeks after publisher EA "made the difficult decision" to stop new development on the looter shooter.

"So, today is my last day at BioWare, I’m moving on to do new things," Warner – who also worked on several other BioWare games, including Mass Effect: Andromeda – tweeted. "BioWare has been home to my grateful heart for nearly ten years and I want to wish them all the best."

"[Dragon Age], [Mass Effect], and [Star Wars: The Old Republic] are in good hands and I can’t wait to play from this side of the screen. Thank you, BioWare".

BioWare's Anthem famously launched back in 2019 to less-than-stellar reviews thanks in large part to clunky UI, unclear game mechanics, and excessive loading screens. Back in October of 2020, BioWare announced huge Anthem changes were on the horizon, including a complete retool of the Javelins and a new Artifacts system. 

Plans for the game's future were laid out in a lengthy blog post from BioWare, months after we saw concept art featuring pirates and a revamped loot system for what the devs were calling Anthem Next.

Just two years and two days after it was released, however, EA has canceled all future development plans.

The high-profile exit comes just a few months after BioWare announced the departure of two of its most senior leaders – general manager Casey Hudson and Dragon Age executive producer Mark Darrah.

Both Hudson and Darrah wrote letters to the community back in December where they gave their thanks to the studio and its fans, and explained that they knew it was a good time to move on. They join a growing cadre of senior leaders that have left the studio in recent years, including James Ohlen, Drew Karpyshyn, David Gaider, and Ben Irving.

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Vikki Blake
Vikki Blake
Weekend Reporter, GamesRadar+

Vikki Blake is GamesRadar+'s Weekend Reporter. Vikki works tirelessly to ensure that you have something to read on the days of the week beginning with 'S', and can also be found contributing to outlets including the BBC, Eurogamer, and GameIndustry.biz. Vikki also runs a weekly games column at NME, and can be frequently found talking about Destiny 2 and Silent Hill on Twitter.