EA goes $20 billion in debt as part of its $55 billion buyout, and the BioWare fans who've already waited 8 years for Mass Effect 5 are terrified of how the company might cut costs

EA is officially going private as part of a $55 billion dollar deal led by Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund, private equity firm Silver Lake, and Jared Kushner's investment firm Affinity Partners. The deal will be partially financed by EA taking on $20 billion in debt – and as the industry wonders how the publisher will deal with that financial burden, BioWare fans in particular are terrified of what might await the beloved RPG studio in the future.

"The transaction will be funded," a press release explains, "by a combination of cash from each of PIF, Silver Lake, and Affinity Partners as well as roll-over of PIF's existing stake in EA, constituting an equity investment of approximately $36 billion, and $20 billion of debt financing fully and solely committed by JPMorgan Chase Bank, N.A., $18 billion of which is expected to be funded at close."

You may have heard about leveraged buyouts funded by private equity in the past, and this is essentially how they work. An investor, or group of investors, puts up some amount of cash to buy a company, while the rest of the purchase price is funded through debt taken on by that company. In grossly simplified terms, once the deal closes, EA will have a $20 billion mortgage on itself.

No one yet knows precisely how EA will pay off that debt, but other leveraged buyouts have often been swiftly followed by money-saving efforts that, well… calling them "aggressive" would be a substantial understatement. As Bloomberg reporter Jason Schreier notes on Bluesky, the EA deal "could mean mass layoffs, more aggressive monetization, and other big cost-cutting measures."

EA's success is propped up by massive franchises like its annual sports games, but the company also owns no shortage of beloved IP. Would the risk of another Titanfall happen when there's $20 billion in debt to pay off? Would a new Skate, whatever issues it might have, ever have been greenlit?

But nobody's more frightened of the possibilities than BioWare fans. The beloved studio has produced some of the most beloved RPGs of all time – the likes of Baldur's Gate, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Mass Effect, and Dragon Age – but it hasn't had a bonafide hit in years. Finally getting to launch a single-player RPG last year seemed like a victory, but Dragon Age: The Veilguard underperformed financial expectations.

"It's over, Commander," as one thread on the Mass Effect subreddit laments, and you'll find a lot of similar sentiments in other comment threads across the internet. The general feeling among fans seems not to be fear about what might happen to BioWare with those financial concerns in mind – they're acting as if the studio is already dead, that Mass Effect 5 is already canceled, and they're mourning accordingly.

Goodbye BioWare, we had an exceptional run, even Andromeda. 💔

— @maisey.bsky.social (@maisey.bsky.social.bsky.social) 2025-10-01T00:51:08.201Z

If BioWare gets added to the pile of Origin, Westwood, Bullfrog, Maxis, and Pandemic, it will really help cement that EAs most meaningful legacy might be shutting down some of the greatest and most foundationally important teams in game development history. That's like killing the Avengers.

— @len.bsky.social (@len.bsky.social.bsky.social) 2025-10-01T00:51:08.215Z

I knew the future of Bioware was bleak, but I didn't think it was gonna be *this* bleak.

— @luke-garou.bsky.social (@luke-garou.bsky.social.bsky.social) 2025-10-01T00:51:08.187Z

Even if BioWare does survive whatever EA does in the future, there's one more concern with the company now owned by investors tied to Saudi Arabia and the US conservative political apparatus. Would BioWare's historic depiction of LGBTQ+ content remain intact? That's a concern even former Mass Effect and Dragon Age narrative designer Trick Weekes seems to share on social media.

Buyers: So your games... guns and football, yes? EA: Mmhmm, mmhmm, mostly guns and football, yep. Buyers: No gay stuff? No politics we're not going to like? EA: Haha, definitely not! Hey, could you give me one sec? I just need to shut down a studio real quick. kotaku.com/report-saudi...

— @trickweekes.bsky.social (@trickweekes.bsky.social.bsky.social) 2025-10-01T00:51:08.084Z

Of course, none of these concerns have yet come to fruition, and it's too early to tell what the future of EA will look like – frankly, it's impossible to predict what will happen because we've never seen a deal like it.

"$20,000,000,000 of debt financing is a shockingly large number to have to service," as games market analyst Mat Piscatella says on Bluesky, "while also transitioning from a public to private organization and all the implications that has on the people that work in it. We've obviously never seen anything like this at this scale in the industry before."

At least the best BioWare games will always be there.