Published Oct 28, 2026, 5:27 PM EDT
Let Larian make Larian games
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The same day Bloomberg broke the news that EA was closing BioWare, one semi-viral post on X neatly summarized the feelings of some fans: The Mass Effect IP should go to CD Projekt Red, Dragon Age to Larian Studios, and Dead Space to Capcom (not BioWare’s in the first place, but the poster was on a roll). Listen: I understand where this is coming from. I adore Larian. I love (most of) the Dragon Age games. I know that bargaining is one of the stages of grief. And I also firmly believe — I am so sorry — that Larian should stay far, far away from Dragon Age.
The possible takeover is hardly a new idea. Fans have been asking Larian to move into Thedas — Dragon Age’s world, a continent of grudging nations and grim cathedrals and a god nobody can quite prove is real — since Baldur’s Gate 3 came out in 2023 and completely rewrote the rules of fantasy RPG storytelling. For the last three years, posts have regularly surfaced on various BG3 or Dragon Age subreddits asking for this precise handover to unfold.
Image: BioWareWith BioWare officially closed as of October 2026, the volume on these pleas went up. One Reddit post with 4,100 upvotes hopes EA sells the IP to “some studio known for making great rpgs.” Who could that be? (One of the post’s most popular replies namedropped Larian.) The Dragon Age community has spent years hoping for a series rescue, and we’re now reading into every tiny new soundbite seemingly telling us this could happen. Former Dragon Age executive producer Mark Darrah told his YouTube audience that with nobody left to make BioWare games, EA might be “more likely” to sell the IPs, though it might also bury them in the vault. And Larian CEO Swen Vincke’s farewell to BioWare, saying it “led the way in making RPGs big,” gave the wish a spark, since Baldur’s Gate 3 is a direct sequel to two of BioWare’s best games.
It’s a lovely idea. It would go wrong in four ways.
Reason one: Larian has already told us where it’s going.
In 2024, the studio said that after six years in the Forgotten Realms, it was ready to “seize this opportunity to develop our own IPs.” That opportunity now has a name: Divinity, announced at The Game Awards in December 2025 as a game even larger than Baldur’s Gate 3. Asking Larian to take on Thedas means asking it to set its dream project down.
Reason two: Licensed IP comes with strings.
Larian has called making a bona fide D&D game “a dream come true,” but the studio has been clear that it’s moving on to its own IP. Regarding previous widespread hopes for a potential Baldur’s Gate 4 from Larian, Vincke has said it’s up to Wizards of the Coast, owners of Baldur’s Gate IP, to “find somebody to take over the torch.” When you’re working with existing characters and worlds, your projects run on someone else’s terms, and the people at Larian seem inclined to stay away from that.
Picking up Dragon Age would put the studio right back in another tightly-controlled world. The series comes with 17 years of lore, a fandom with very firm opinions, and significant baggage. Dragon Age’s latest entry, The Veilguard, went through an “extraordinarily tumultuous” development cycle and was met with what could only be described as mixed reviews. This is a lot to ask a new owner to deal with. (Some fans have noted that they’d rather see former BioWare people carry the torch, possibly in a brand-new studio of their own, than saddle an heir like Larian with buying the IP and wrestling with its legacy.)
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Reason three: The fit is less clean than it sounds.
Baldur’s Gate 3 was a masterpiece in part because Larian made the game unmistakably Larian. Fans of Larian’s other works — notably Divinity: Original Sin 2 — will recognize Larian in Baldur Gate 3’s goofy dialogue options, the environmental puzzle solving wherein a barrel of oil can help you skip a fight, and, in particular, the turn-based combat. No mainline Dragon Age game has been turn-based: Origins runs on real-time combat with pause and tactics slots, and the later games lean more toward action, with The Veilguard straight-up being an action RPG. There are Dragon Age fans, including some who love Larian, who simply say they’d rather not get a turn-based Dragon Age. Hand Dragon Age to Larian, and the likely result is a Larian game wearing a Dragon Age hat.
Image: BioWareReason four: EA owns Dragon Age’s IP, and nobody’s said it’s for sale.
Darrah has said EA’s first order of business is figuring out what to cut so it doesn’t drown in interest on its debt, which suggests any sale would chase the biggest return it can get. He has also said EA doesn’t see Dragon Age’s mainstream potential and turned down BioWare’s pitches for a remaster. Would Larian owning Dragon Age beat EA letting it gather dust? Probably. But that’s a low bar, and a studio this good deserves a higher one.
If you want to honor BioWare, Dragon Age, and Larian, there are better ways to make that happen. BioWare veterans are already building the studio’s spiritual heirs, with studios like Archetype Entertainment (which is making the sci-fi RPG Exodus) and Arcanaut Studios (which is led by former top BioWare creative Casey Hudson, and developing Star Wars: Fate of the Old Republic). You can and should replay the absolute masterclasses in narrative design that are Dragon Age Origins and Divinity: Original Sin 2. And you can let Larian focus on making the next thing only Larian can make on their own terms, one weird, ambitious original at a time. That’s the way BioWare gave us Dragon Age in the first place. It’s Larian’s turn to do the same.
