Electronic Arts shuts down BioWare and cancels the next MASS EFFECT game

In news that is not entirely unexpected, but the timing certainly is, Electronic Arts is to shut down BioWare, the legendary RPG studio behind some of the greatest games in history, including Baldur's Gate, Baldur's Gate II, Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Mass Effect and Dragon Age: Origins, along with their respective sequels. The fifth Mass Effect game, in development at the studio since at least 2020, has been cancelled.

BioWare was founded in Edmonton, Canada in 1995 by Ray Muzyka, Greg Zechuk and Augustine Yip. Their first game, Shattered Steel, was a mech combat title, published by Interplay Entertainment in 1996. Their second title was planned to be a fantasy roleplaying game with the working title Battleground: Infinity, using impressive new tech that was quickly dubbed the Infinity Engine. Interplay, impressed by a demo, suggested merging the game with their own Dungeons & Dragons video game licence. The resulting game, Baldur's Gate, was released in late 1998 and was hugely critically acclaimed, enjoying strong sales. Arguably, this was the first game to come close to nailing the atmosphere of playing a tabletop game of D&D. The game also had a robust multiplayer mode, allowing people to play different characters at the same time in a classic D&D party. BioWare developed an expansion pack, Tales of the Sword Coast (1999), and a fully-fledged, far more ambitious sequel, Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn (2000), still regarded as one of the finest video games of all time. Baldur's Gate II also received its own expansion, Throne of Bhaal (2001), which brought the story to an end (for twenty years, anyway).

In the meantime, Interplay licensed the Infinity Engine for their inhouse development team, Black Isle Studios, to develop their own Dungeons & Dragons games, giving rise to Planescape: Torment (1999), Icewind Dale (2000) and Icewind Dale II (2002). Collaboration between the two companies remained strong and BioWare began development of Neverwinter Nights (2002), their first 3D title. However, Interplay lost the D&D licence to Atari, who published Neverwinter Nights instead. Interplay and Black Isle went into financial freefall and collapsed in 2003, ironically whilst working on Baldur's Gate III: The Black Hound and Fallout 3: Van Buren, neither of which was ever finished.

BioWare had entered into discussions with LucasArts and in 2003 released Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, an epic roleplaying game set 4,000 years before the events of the films. Released at a moment when the franchise was at a low critical ebb, due to the perceived two disappointing prequel films, the game received enormous praise for its writing and central plot twist, which some held to be better than Empire Strikes Back's twist. Surprisingly, BioWare passed on developing the sequel, instead recommending Obsidian Entertainment, a new company set up by their friends who had escaped the collapse of Black Isle and Interplay. Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords was released in 2004 and began Obsidian's own storied (though bumpier) journey through the RPG space.

By this point BioWare had made the strategic decision that they were spending too much money on licences for other people's properties, and decided to develop their own worlds from scratch. This resulted in Jade Empire (2005), an Asian-influenced hybrid of roleplaying game and martial arts brawler. The game was critically well-received, but the RPG hardcore audience disliked the streamlining of RPG mechanics and the general audience seemed confused over the game's genre. Though it did okay, it did not meet BioWare's sales expectations and plans for a sequel were dropped.

BioWare's next game was Mass Effect (2007), an epic RPG that was an effective spiritual successor to Knights of the Old Republic, but in an original science fiction universe. Again, the RPG hardcore was let down by the removal of even more RPG mechanics, but the game's character creation system, dialogue choices, writing, worldbuilding and hugely iconic plot twists, which the player could influence, were all hugely praised. The game, originally published in a deal with Microsoft, sold quite well and attracted the attention of Electronic Arts, who acquired BioWare in late 2007.

One of the prevailing narratives through the years since has been that EA interfered significantly in BioWare's internal development. Upon acquiring the studio EA learned that their in-development game, a spiritual successor to Baldur's Gate called Dragon Age: Origins, was planned to be a PC-only title, despite having been in development already for several years and had spent a large amount of money. EA mandated the game be released on consoles as well and a marketing campaign filled with blood and gore was launched, which some people felt heavily misrepresented the tone and style of the game. Appalled at the game's budget, EA also demanded a "quickie" sequel to be developed in just one year. Dragon Age: Origins (2009) was extremely well-received reviewed on PC, but the console ports were criticised for being underwhelming. Dragon Age II (2011) was even more fiercely criticised for heavy reuse of limited assets, being a much shorter game than Origins, and removing a lot of RPG mechanics in favour of lots and lots of combat.

In between, BioWare released Mass Effect 2 (2010), possibly their single most well-received game, which featured greatly improved combat and a companion character mechanic which saw the player have to recruit a dirty dozen to take on an alien threat, with tremendous freedom in which characters to select and how to use them in the final mission, with differing numbers of casualties and outcomes possible. However, during the development of this game, development started of a Star Wars online multiplayer game, and the Mass Effect franchise lost some of its main writers to the new game. Star Wars: The Old Republic was released in 2011 to some good reviews and reasonable sales, but a lot of fan scepticism, especially those who perceived the game would prevent the development of a "proper" Knights of the Old Republic III.

Mass Effect 3 (2012), which concluded the epic story begun in the first game five years earlier, launched to a storm of controversy with players incensed that the complex choices players had made through three games was reduced to choosing one of three options at the very end of the game, and the game being thematically incoherent with the ideas being laid down in the earlier titles, which they blamed on some personnel (particularly chief writer and worldbuilding Drew Karpyshyn) being moved over to the Star Wars game. BioWare responded to the criticism by issuing patches rewriting the ending to acknowledge more of the players' choices, though ultimately it could only go so far. A few months later, the remaining BioWare founders at the company all quit.

Dragon Age: Inquisition was released in 2014 and was the company's biggest-selling game. Despite this, the game suffered criticism for being too big and long, an overreaction to Dragon Age II's shortness, and by being an open-world game, chasing the appeal of Skyrim, whilst not having game systems well-suited for that format. The game's critical cachet improved markedly with the release of its expansion, Trespasser (2015).

Mass Effect: Andromeda was released in 2017 and received fierce criticism for a likewise dramatic change to the series' structure, pursuing a similar open-world environment, albeit this time on multiple planets. The game was also criticised for having weaker characters than the trilogy, and by removing the action to the Andromeda Galaxy and some 800 years further in the future, many fan-favourite characters, species and ships were missing from the title. The game also launched in a heavily-bugged state. The game's critical cachet has improved somewhat in subsequent years, and its combat has been praised as the best in the series, but the game's financial underperformance was a bigger problem it could not solve. Anthem, a multiplayer shooter based around jetpacks, was released in 2019 and was the company's biggest failure to date, launching with an anemic amount of content.

The company rallied in 2021 for Mass Effect: Legendary Edition, a comprehensive remaster and re-release of the original trilogy as one game, optimised for modern systems. The remaster was regarded as a success, introducing the franchise to a new generation and selling well.

In 2024 BioWare released what would prove to be their final game: Dragon Age: The Veilguard. The game had been developed as a multiplayer title before pivoting to a single-player focus, and the game was criticised for weird pacing, an unusual visual aesthetic compared to the previous games and some odd mechanics and gameplay ideas that may have been remnants of the multiplayer focus. Though not completely without merit, the game's critical reception was dubious and its commercial success dire.

BioWare had confirmed they were working on a new Mass Effect game that would feature a return to the Milky Way Galaxy and would be a more direct sequel to the original trilogy, with some OG characters returning. In 2025, Amazon Television confirmed that a Mass Effect TV series was also in development. It was well-known inside and outside the company that "Mass Effect 5" (the final title would have likely been different) was the studio's last chance to shine, and failure would likely mean the shuttering of the company.

However, it's now clear that Electronic Arts had decided not to even give them that chance. Despite releasing a teaser trailer for the game in 2023, no new footage or information about the game had been released in over three years. Today's storm of news stories confirm that the game was in "early" development nine years after the release of the previous game in the series, which was clearly unacceptable. EA themselves may have been responsible for this, putting the studio through rounds of lay-offs after Veilguard's release that may have simply made it impossible for them to make a brand new AAA game. Some of today's reporting suggests that only 50 employees were left working at BioWare, clearly far too few to even consider the game in full production. Some reporting indicates that EA had been rotating BioWare personnel into other studios and projects for some time.

BioWare's obituary will be simply having created some of the greatest video games of all time. Baldur's Gate I and II, Knights of the Old Republic, all three Mass Effect games (despite the ropey ending) and Dragon Age: Origins are all-timer classics of the genre. Neverwinter Nights, Jade Empire, Dragon Age II and Mass Effect: Andromeda are also all pretty solid games in their own right, if not of the same calibre. Dragon Age: Inquisition was also well-received, though I must confess that in my several attempts to play the game, I bounced off it pretty hard.

BioWare's legacy is also in the studios that it inspired. Without BioWare's early help and recommendations, Obsidian Entertainment would have likely never survived and achieved the things they did. CD Projekt Red also owe their existence to BioWare, having started off as the Polish localisation team for the Baldur's Gate games before licencing BioWare's Aurora Engine for The Witcher (2007), which was published by Atari on BioWare's recommendation. Larian Studios mooted their Divinity series as a spiritual successor to the Baldur's Gate games which led to them getting the licence to make Baldur's Gate III, an absolutely massive giga-success on release in 2023. Fans and personnel at BioWare themselves both asked why BioWare wasn't making that game instead. Other companies exist thanks to BioWare veterans, such as Beamdog (founded by ex-BioWare vets to release successful remasters of Baldur's Gate and its sequel) and Archetype Entertainmen, who will release their Mass Effect spiritual successor Exodus in April 2027.

The feeling, fairly or not, was that since at least the EA takeover in 2009, BioWare could no longer take creative risks and they were constantly funnelled into chasing trends rather than establishing them. Inquisition's open-world pivot was a response to the success of Skyrim, whilst Anthem was chasing the success of the likes of Destiny (without any understanding of why that was a success). EA, whose most successful franchises were online shooters and sports games, were an awkward fit for BioWare from the start. However, some commentators have cautioned on this as an overly simplistic narrative, pointing out that Anthem was a project originated by BioWare themselves and pushed by leadership at the studio.

Certainly BioWare's dramatically slowed release cadence was a problem; they released seven games in their first decade, ten in their second but then only three in their third (four only if you count a remaster). Sales were also an issue: Inquisition was, by far, their biggest-selling game but never cracked 20 million units, less than a third of Skyrim. Most of their games stayed under 10 million units sold. It did sometimes feel that BioWare was often treated and reported on as an AAA industry-leader developer but its sales never really reflected that (unlike Bethesda, CD Projekt Red post-Witcher III, Blizzard etc). This wasn't a problem when budgets were low and their release frequency was high, but as their budgets shot up and their release schedule elongated to ridiculous timespans, the situation clearly became untenable.

It will be interesting to see if EA does anything with the franchises it now owns in full after BioWare's dissolution, or if interested third parties try to acquire those series to do something with them. Whilst the company is gone, its games remain, and many of them remain solid gold classics.

STAR WARS: FATE OF THE OLD REPUBLIC announced

A new Star Wars video game has been announced at the 2025 Game Awards.

Star Wars: Fate of the Old Republic is an action-RPG successor to Knights of the Old Republic I and II, and is directed by Casey Hudson, who was the project director on the original Knights of the Old Republic (as well as the Mass Effect trilogy). His new studio Arcanaut is developing the game alongside Lucasfilm Games.

In an interview, Hudson confirms the game is very early in development and is not a direct sequel to the existing games, but is a successor in a similar time period.

No release date has been set so far.

KNIGHTS OF THE OLD REPUBLIC remake on hold at Aspyr and in "serious trouble"

In surprising news, Aspyr Media has put its eagerly-awaited remake of classic Star Wars CRPG Knights of the Old Republic on hold.

Knights of the Old Republic was released by BioWare in 2003 and has been regularly acclaimed as one of the very best Star Wars video games of all time, and one of the very best CRPGs. A sequel, Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords was released in 2004 and launched the career of Obsidian Entertainment. The game was released during BioWare's "imperial period" when everything they made was either great or at least ambitiously interesting. Baldur's Gate II (2000), Neverwinter Nights (2002), Jade Empire (2005) and Mass Effect (2007) all hail from this period as well. BioWare has since fallen on tougher times, with Dragon Age II (2011), Mass Effect 3 (2012), Dragon Age: Inquisition (2014), Mass Effect: Andromeda (2017) and Anthem (2020) all suffering controversies of one kind or another, and the latter two also experiencing poor sales. Critics and fans have frequently said that BioWare needs to get back to making games of the type and scale as Knights of the Old Republic to return to success.

Aspyr Media, based in Texas, has focused on porting existing games to new formats, including porting Knights of the Old Republic itself to MacOS in 2004. Knights of the Old Republic Remake was announced in 2021 as Aspyr's first large-scale, big-budget video game project. The game is a total, ground-up remake of the original title using modern graphics technology and new voice acting (including the return of fan-favourite actor Jennifer Hale).

Unfortunately, it appears that Aspyr were unprepared for the scale of the project. Internally and informally, Aspyr were targeting a late 2022 release date, but insiders have noted this is unachievable and unrealistic, and that a release date of 2025 is more likely. It also sounds like the game may have started off with more modest goals but transformed into a full-on remake when it became clear how difficult using the original code and assets was going to be. If it's the case that Aspyr envisaged a more modest remaster and scaled up to something of the scope of the Final Fantasy VII Remake, it's unsurprising that they've realised they've bitten off more than they can chew.

Whether the project is remounted in the future remains to be seen, but unfortunately, it looks like the project is not happening in the near future.

STAR WARS: KNIGHTS OF THE OLD REPUBLIC REMAKE officially announced

Aspyr Media are working on a full remake of Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, arguably the greatest and best-regarded Star Wars video game of all time*.

Knights of the Old Republic, developed by BioWare in association with LucasArts, was released in 2003. Set roughly 4,000 years before the events of The Phantom Menace, the game tells the story of a war being fought between the Galactic Republic and its Jedi defenders against a Sith army and fleet led by Darth Malak. The player takes on the role of a character of their own creation who is roped into helping rescue a Jedi Knight named Bastila Shan from the city-planet Taris. As the game continues, the player acquires a large array of allies, such as the murderous and meme-generating assassin droid HK-47, and learns a shocking secret about themselves. Events culminate in a final battle between the Republic and the Sith Empire.

The game was immensely successful on release, generating both critical acclaim and high sales. It was followed by two sequels: the more ambitious but more divisive sequel, Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords (2004) from Obsidian Entertainment; and MMORPG The Old Republic (2011) by BioWare themselves. Although set in an original universe, the later Mass Effect trilogy (2007-12) draws on some structural ideas from Knights of the Old Republic.

It is unclear how thorough a remake this will be, since no gameplay footage has been shown. The "remake" title and the age of the game and engine suggest that it'd have to be a much more thorough reworking of the game from scratch, possibly in a new engine, rather than the "retexture-and-polish" style of remakes like the Mass Effect Legendary Edition.

Knights of the Old Republic Remake is "early" in development and no release date has yet been set. So far, it has only been announced for PlayStation 5.

* Arguments for TIE Fighter, Republic Commando and Jedi Outcast can be heard at a later date.

RUMOUR: KNIGHTS OF THE OLD REPUBLIC project underway at Aspyr Media

Aspyr Media, a video game porting company based in Austin, Texas, are reportedly working on a Knights of the Old Republic project in conjunction with Lucasfilm Games, according to strong rumours.

Aspyr is best-known for porting games from one platform to another, including multiple BioWare games including the original Knights of the Old Republic and Jade Empire. Just this month they were acquired by Embracer Group and have been partnered with Embracer's subsidiary, Saber Interactive. Saber have a mixed history of ports (including recently working on the Halo: Master Chief Collection on PC and the next-gen versions of The Witcher 3) and original games including Evil Dead: The Game and the popular off-road games Spintires and SnowRunner.

According to a mixed release of information from investor calls and podcasts, Aspyr are now working on a licensed, original IP project with a budget of $70 million. They have also been busy hiring artists, designers and writers, including a large number of ex-BioWare Austin staff (many of whom worked on Star Wars: The Old Republic) to effectively form a studio from scratch for this project.

The budget is interesting; on the low side for a totally original, AAA Star Wars game, but reasonable for a thorough re-imagining and remake (versus a much more simplistic remaster) of one of the most popular and acclaimed CRPGs of the 2000s.

This may make sense. Disney recently omitted the Old Republic Era from its new canon timeline, but is maintaining The Old Republic MMORPG as an ongoing concern, complete with input from the Star Wars Story Group (the keepers of the canon). Remaking Knights of the Old Republic (and possibly its sequel) for a new audience with some changes to keep things to their liking is a solid move.

Two years ago, Disney were also apparently considering ideas for a Knights of the Old Republic movie or TV series from Altered Carbon writer Laeta Kalogridis, but this idea was put on the backburner due to the under-performance of The Rise of Skywalker and subsequent reshuffling of ideas for the property.

Hopefully this rumour will be clarified in the near future.

New STAR WARS official timeline seems to formally confirm that the OLD REPUBLIC era is no longer canon

Disney has released a new timeline for the Star Wars universe, with a list of the material they regard as canon. The list seemingly confirms that the extremely popular "Old Republic Era," the only era from the pre-Disney period whose canonical status was still in some doubt, is definitely no longer canon.

The timeline divides the Star Wars timeline into six distinct eras:

• The High Republic (c. 400-200 Before the Battle of Yavin): a period extending from roughly 400 to 200 years before the events of The Phantom Menace, during which time the Galactic Republic and the Jedi Order are at the height of their power. The era includes the High Republic line of comics and novels, and the forthcoming TV series The Acolyte.

• Fall of the Jedi (32-19 BBY): This period depicts the fall of the Old Republic and the Jedi Order over a period of more than a decade. This period includes the Prequel Trilogy (The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith) as well as the Clone Wars animated series.

• Reign of the Empire (19-5 BBY): This period depicts the Galactic Empire at the height of its power, with Emperor Palpatine and Darth Vader in unquestioned command of the galaxy. This period includes the forthcoming animated series The Bad Batch, the film Solo: A Star Wars Story and the Disney+ series Obi-Wan Kenobi.

• Age of Rebellion (5 BBY-4 After Battle of Yavin): This period depicts the Galactic Civil War between the Empire and the Rebel Alliance, culminating in the Battle of Endor. The Original Trilogy (Star Wars, aka A New Hope; The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi) takes place in this era, along with the spin-off film Rogue One, the live-action show Andor and the animated series Rebels.

• The New Republic (4 ABY-29 ABY): This period depicts the reorganisation of the Rebel Alliance into the New Republic and its attempts to bring peace and order to the galaxy. The Mandalorian and forthcoming spin-off shows The Book of Boba Fett, Rangers of the New Republic and presumably Ahsoka take place in this time period.

• Rise of the First Order (29-35 ABY): This period depicts the conflict between the First Order, a successor-state to the Empire, and the New Republic and, after the Republic's at least partial collapse following the Starkiller Incident, the Resistance. This period concludes with the Battle of Exegol. The Sequel Trilogy (The Force Awakens, The Last Jedi and The Rise of Skywalker) take place in this era, along with the animated series Resistance.

The new timeline leaves off a number of projects whose time frames have not yet been confirmed, including the Lando TV series and and the Rogue Squadron film.

Notably missing from the timeline is the "Old Republic" era. This era ranges from 3956 BBY to 3630 BBY and depicts a vast, complex struggle between the Galactic Republic and various opponents, including several "Sith Empires," at a time when the Sith were numerous and not restricted by their later Rule of Two. The era was popularised by the popular video game Knights of the Old Republic (2003) and expanded by Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords (2004) and multiplayer game The Old Republic (2011).

Technically, as these games predate the takeover of Lucasfilm by Disney, it was believed that they were non-canon and automatically relegated to "Legends" status. However, the situation became confused because The Old Republic has remained an ongoing concern in the Disney era and the Star Wars Story Group, the body charged with maintaining the new canon, has been vetting and approving Old Republic story material since 2012. With the events of both older games integral to The Old Republic and all three games referring to comic books set in the same time period, this left the possibility that the entire era would remain in canon, especially given its separation from the rest of the Star Wars universe by more than three and a half thousand years.

Adding to the confusion is the fact that Darth Revan, a major character from this era, was brought into canon by being referenced in official material accompanying the release of The Rise of Skywalker (he was also slated to appear as a vision in an episode of The Clone Wars, but this was cut at the last minute).

Of course, Disney may be simply hedging their bets by not featuring the Old Republic era on this timeline, but it does seem they are finally committing to the events of The Old Republic era not being canonical, which is an interesting choice for a game they are still charging money for (albeit not as much as they once did).

Intriguingly, there were rumours between a year and two years ago that Lucasfilm was considering both a new Knights of the Old Republic video game set in the era (possibly a ground-up reworking of the original game) and a film, with Laeta Kalogridis tapped to write. Nothing has come of those rumours since then.

Rumour: new STAR WARS: KNIGHTS OF THE OLD REPUBLIC game in development

Fansite Cinelinx, which broke the news about the Star Wars Obi-Wan TV show last year, has reported that a new Knights of the Old Republic title is in development at Electronic Arts.

The original Knights of the Old Republic was developed by BioWare and released by Lucasfilm in 2003 and is fondly remembered as one of the greatest Star Wars video games of all time. Its sequel, Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords, the first game from Obsidian Entertainment, is almost as acclaimed but was released in a notoriously buggy state. In 2011 BioWare and Electronic Arts released The Old Republic, a massively multiplayer RPG which also served as a sequel-of-sorts to the earlier two games.

BioWare has apparently been keen to make a proper Knights of the Old Republic III for some years and discussed the project several times with parent company EA after they acquired the Star Wars licence. Reportedly some prototyping work was done in 2015 but was then put on ice whilst the company focused on Mass Effect: Andromeda and Anthem.

Cinelinx's report is interesting, as it suggests that the game currently being developed is a reboot of the Knights of the Old Republic game, part-remake and part-sequel, that would bring it into the new canon of the Disney era. The approach is similar to that of the recent God of War reboot game.

This news comes as Lucasfilm is apparently working on "Project Luminous," a multimedia "event" which will apparently encompass video games and comic books launching in 2021, with a design to feeding into the next set of live-action films. These will reportedly be set 400 years before the events of The Phantom Menace in an era called the "High Republic." These reports baffled some fans, who wondered if they'd dropped a zero and were in fact referring to the Old Republic era of 4,000 years earlier, the same time period as Knights of the Old Republic. Another possibility is that the Old Republic era is being retconned to taking place much more recently. This is given credence by reports in 2019 that the showrunner of Altered Carbon was writing a move script inspired by Knights of the Old Republic.

What is interesting is that there is no mention of BioWare being involved in the new project. BioWare are still actively developing Anthem after a less-than-stellar launch, are also developing a fourth Dragon Age game and reportedly are now in pre-production on a fifth Mass Effect game. Electronic Arts developing a new Old Republic game but giving it to another of their studios would seem unlikely and rather disrespectful to BioWare, but given the limited bandwidth at BioWare it would seem the only conclusion if this game is indeed to be released in the next two years or so.

More news as it develops.

New STAR WARS movies rumoured to focus on period 400 years in the past

Rumours are circulating about the next few Star Wars movies, suggesting they will take place in a new historical era known as the "High Republic," set some 400 years before the events of the other movies.

The Star Wars franchise has so far spanned three main eras: the Old Republic/prequel trilogy era, which includes the Clone Wars; the Galactic Civil War/original trilogy era, which includes the war between the Empire and the Rebel Alliance; and the First Order/sequel trilogy era, which includes the struggle between the Resistance and the First Order. These three eras are all pretty close in time, spanning only sixty-six years between the events of The Phantom Menace and The Rise of Skywalker.

The now-retired Expanded Universe featured other eras of Star Wars history, most notably the "Reformation Era" set about 1,000 years before the films and focusing on the reorganisation of the Republic into its later form and the threat posed by Darth Bane.

Far better-known and more popular is the "Old Republic Era," which is set about 4,000 years before the films and focuses on a series of ancient struggles between the Jedi and the Sith which devastated vast areas of the galaxy. This era was the setting for a very popular comics series and also the best-selling Knights of the Old Republic series of video games. The current Star Wars online RPG, The Old Republic, is still set in this era and its future story direction is being directed by the Lucasfilm Story Group, semi-canonising it under the new Disney regime.

Last year it was reported that Altered Carbon showrunner Laeta Kalogridis was developing a film script based on the original Knights of the Old Republic and that Disney were planning to set all of their currently in-development films post-Rise of Skywalker in this era, including a trilogy spearheaded by Last Jedi director Rian Johnson and a multi-film project led by former Game of Thrones showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss. Benioff and Weiss subsequently walked from the project and the under-performance of recent Star Wars media has left the future of the franchise in the cinema in some doubt.

According to the report, Disney are now most likely to press on with their "Project Luminous" idea, except it won't be set 4,000 years earlier but four hundred years before the existing movies. Reportedly, this project will incorporate the next few feature films, video games, novels and comic books, and will focus on a group of Jedi exploring the Unknown Regions of the galaxy. Exploration and confronting new threats will apparently be a focus, along with a possible confrontation with a group of Sith hiding in remote corners of the galaxy.

The wisdom of abandoning all of the familiar parts of the Star Wars setting, as well as the popular Knights of the Old Republic sub-setting, for a completely fresh time period is questionable. The quality of the project will depend on the creative talent involved, which has yet to be confirmed.

Although it sounds like most or all Star Wars projects in the medium term will focus on this new setting, Lucasfilm will continue to explore more familiar settings through further seasons of The Mandalorian, as well as their up-coming mini-series focusing on Obi-Wan and a prequel spin-off from Rogue One.

David Benioff & D.B. Weiss part ways with STAR WARS

In surprising news, former Game of Thrones showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss have parted ways from Lucasfilm after being announced as writing and possibly directing the next Star Wars movie after The Rise of Skywalker, due for release in 2022.

Benioff and Weiss signed with Lucasfilm and Disney eighteen months ago to develop a fresh Star Wars film series that would be set in a time and location far-removed from both the nine-part main "Skywalker Saga" and the stand-alone spin-offs. Director Rian Johnson is also developing a trilogy with an eye to setting up a new setting and cast of characters for the films. According to other reports, either setting may be a revamped version of the popular Knights of the Old Republic setting, with writer Laeta Kalogridis developing early concepts for the idea, including possible direct adaptations of the popular video games.

Benioff and Weiss's departure appears to be due to their massive $200 million development deal with Netflix for new TV series and projects. It is unclear what these new projects will be, or if the money was well-spent; Benioff and Weiss experienced a critical drubbing this week after an interview in which they seemed to suggest they didn't know what they were doing with Game of Thrones, ignored the primary themes of the novels and admitted they were more interested in adapting set-pieces and stand-out scenes than the story as a whole. Benioff and Weiss's former partners at HBO also seem to have distanced themselves from the producers, refusing to even bid with Netflix to retain their services, quietly dropping their Confederate TV pitch into a dumpster after the negative publicity it received and pivoting hard to supporting and working with George R.R. Martin on other projects.

The critical opprobrium and disdain may be overstated - Benioff and Weiss did bring the books to television and made it the most popular contemporary fantasy series in the world, as well as giving HBO it's biggest-ever TV hit - but it seems that the industry has certainly cooled towards the writing team who, just a couple of years ago, could do no wrong.

The news won't help the headaches over at Lucasfilm either, who have been experiencing a lengthy run of directors dropping out or even getting fired on Star Wars projects. They will now have to either accelerate plans for Rian Johnson's next Star Wars movie or they will have to find a new team to step into Benioff and Weiss's shoes to bring the next film to the screen.

Head of Marvel Studios to develop a STAR WARS movie

Kevin Feige, the head of Marvel Studios and creative directory of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, is to collaborate with the team at Lucasfilm on a new Star Wars movie.

The news is surprising because Feige has a pretty busy slate on his hands, with numerous films and TV shows in development in the MCU. However, Feige is also a huge Star Wars fan and with an opening in his schedule (presumably related to the Sony/Marvel Spider-Man break-up), it appears he wants to help out the Lucasfilm team with their slate of upcoming TV shows and films.

There's no word yet on the nature of the project, although at the moment it sounds like a single film and that it will be part of the "new era" of Star Wars films set to follow the release of The Rise of Skywalker in December, which will conclude the story of Rey, Kylo Ren, Poe Dameron and Finn that began with The Force Awakens in 2015. The film will also reportedly end the nine-part, "trilogy of trilogies" extending back to the release of the original Star Wars in 1977.

Disney's handling of the Star Wars franchise has had mixed results, with a well-received TV show (Rebels) and movie (The Force Awakens) followed by The Last Jedi, which had very mixed results, and the animated show Resistance, which has been cancelled after just two seasons and poor reviews. Of the spin-off films, Rogue One did very well but Solo became the first-ever Star Wars film to lose money at the box office, despite a positive critical reception.

These results have led to Lucasfilm delaying the release of the next Star Wars film (after Rise) to 2022. Former Game of Thrones showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss are developing a multi-film series, whilst The Last Jedi director Rian Johnson is committed to a trilogy of films. Both series are apparently set in a new period of time and a part of the galaxy distinct from previous worlds. Rumours persist that the new wave of Star Wars films - presumably including Feige's - will be set in the Knights of the Old Republic time period, but this remains unconfirmed.

The next Star Wars project to hit the screens will the franchise's first-ever live-action TV show, The Mandalorian, which will help launch the Disney+ streaming service on 12 November this year. Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker hits cinemas on 20 December.

STAR WARS: KNIGHTS OF THE OLD REPUBLIC movie in development at Lucasfilm

Buzzfeed has scooped the news that Lucasfilm are developing a script based on the critically-acclaimed and massive-selling 2003 video game Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, developed by BioWare.

Screenwriter Laeta Kalogridis (Shutter Island, Altered Carbon, er, Terminator: Genisys) is reportedly developing a film trilogy based on the game and has almost completed the script for the first film in the series.

Set over 4,000 years before the events of the Star Wars prequel trilogy, the game tells the story of an amnesiac Jedi who awakens on a starship above the planet Taris that is under attack by Darth Malak's forces. The galaxy at this time is engaged in a civil war between open Jedi forces, led by the Jedi Council, and Sith forces under Darth Malak, former apprentice to the slain Darth Revan. The Republic is weak and divided between the two factions and a strong neutral faction.

The game sees the protagonist (named by the player) gaining a large number of powerful friends and allies, including Republic pilot Carth Onasi, Wookie warrior Zaalbar, Jedi Knight Bastila Shan, Mandalorian warrior Cancerous Ordo, psychopathic droid HK-47 and warrior Juhani (the first-ever canonically gay character to appear in Star Wars) following a trail of clues that leads to Darth Malak's true objective, a powerful weapon known as the Star Forge.

It is unclear if the new project plans to adapt the game - a single playthrough of which can last for well over 20 hours - as three movies, or if it will be to adapt the game as one movie with possible sequels based on Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords (2004) and The Old Republic (2011).

It is also unclear if Kalogridis is developing the film as the one to be produced and directed by David Benioff and D.B. Weiss for release in 2022, or for Rian Johnson's trilogy project, or as a speculative script unrelated to the above (possibly for Disney+?). It should be noted that Lucasfilm have been adamant that the post-Rise of Skywalker movies will take place in a completely different part of the Star Wars canon in both time and place, which this would certainly qualify for.

If the rumour is true, Laeta Kalogridis will become the first woman to write for a Star Wars film since Leigh Brackett wrote the first draft of the script for The Empire Strikes Back in the late 1970s.

Knights of the Old Republic is comfortably one of the most popular Star Wars stories and projects of all time, often ranking high on lists of the most popular instalments of the Star Wars franchise. BioWare have frequently discussed making a Knights of the Old Republic III, the last time as recently as completing work on Mass Effect 4 and moving that team over to Anthem, but reportedly their publisher Electronic Arts are sceptical of the appeal of a single-player focused RPG with no microtransactions or multiplayer element.

Lucasfilm have neither confirmed nor denied the story as yet.

Mass Effect 4 - Knights of the Old Republic 3

Following up their comments a few weeks ago, Obsidian have confirmed that they have pitched a new Star Wars roleplaying game to LucasArts. The new game won't actually be Knights of the Old Republic III, as it will be set between Revenge of the Sith and A New Hope. Obsidian's top writer, Chris Avellone, has developed and written the story. Obsidian are waiting to hear back from LucasArts and their new owner, Disney (who have made discouraging noises about not wanting to focus on big gaming projects any more) about their pitch.

Don't expect to be seeing many - or any - of these guys in the new Mass Effect.

Meanwhile, BioWare have made a lot of confusing comments about Mass Effect 4. The only thing they have seemingly confirmed is that it will not be called Mass Effect 4. In a bizarre twist one of the developers has said that "the game does not have to come after. Or before. Or off to the side. Or with characters you know." Actually, logically it kind of does, unless it's set in a completely different universe (and hence wouldn't be a Mass Effect title). Good to see that BioWare still can't make a single announcement about the Mass Effect franchise without turning into a confusing mess. However, it does confirm that Mass Effect 4: Whatever is now in active development.

Meanwhile, Ubisoft have confirmed that Far Cry 3 has sold 4 million copies since its release, far outstripping their projections. As a result, they have confirmed that a Far Cry 4 will be released within the next three to four years. Surprising no-one, they have also confirmed that a new Assassin's Creed game is in the offering for 2014. Assassin's Creed III has sold a staggering 12 million copies since its release just three months ago.

Wertzone Classics: Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II - The Sith Lords

It is a time of great turmoil in the Galaxy. A decade ago, two powerful Jedi warriors, Revan and Malak, rejected the decision of the Jedi High Council that the Order would remain neutral in the war between the Mandalorians and the Republic. Siding with the Republic, Revan, Malak and their followers eventually defeated the Mandalorians in a bloody battle at Malachor V, leaving that world shattered and millions dead. After that battle Revan and Malak turned to the Dark Side of the Force, forging a new Sith Empire. Revan was usurped by Malak, who in turn was defeated by the forces of the Republic in an epic battle above a remote planet called Rakata Prime.


The death of Malak did not end the chaos in the Galaxy. New Sith lords have arisen and Sith assassins have continued to strike, targeting the few Jedi who had survived the Mandalorian conflict and the Jedi Civil War that came after. The Jedi Order disbanded, its few surviving members disappearing, leaving the war-ravaged Republic vulnerable.

Unexpectedly, one of the Jedi warriors who followed Revan into battle at Malachor has resurfaced, stripped of her connection to the Force. Rescued from certain death by a ship called the Ebon Hawk and taken to a hospital facility on Peragus, this warrior now has to find out what has happened, who tried to kill her and why she can no longer use the Force. To this end she accumulates a band of allies, learns the fate of the other Jedi and is brought to a new understanding of the Force by a very enigmatic mentor...

Knights of the Old Republic II is to its predecessor what The Empire Strikes Back is to A New Hope: the grittier, more brooding and more philosophical sequel with a dark, ambiguous conclusion. However, it doesn't match Empire's primary achievement - of being a sequel superior to the original - for various reasons.

Knights of the Old Republic II's biggest problem is the incredible vagueness of the story at the start of the game. KotOR I put you in a big city with lots of options and quests to do right off the bat and plenty of characters and politics to interact with. KotOR II instead has you exploring a space station pressing buttons for what feels like ages (it's actually about an hour and a half of fairly tedious running around) and you're not really given a reason for doing so. Your character is also curiously unwilling to ask questions of the strange old woman, Kreia, who has appeared out of nowhere to mentor you. It's about halfway through the game before you can even ask if she's a Jedi, which is the question I wanted to ask about two minutes after meeting her.

Once the oddball opening sequence is dispensed with, you find yourself on Citadel Station orbiting Telos, and the more familiar playing style of the first game kicks in. From here you have lots of quests and sub-quests to pursue, different factions to ally with or play off against one another and several characters you can recruit to your party. The relationship between your character and Kreia also develops impressively, as Kreia has adopted a philosophical relationship with the Force which is fairly unusual and complex, going beyond the simplistic Light Side = Good, Dark Side = Bad notions of George Lucas and some of the less thoughtful other Star Wars writers. This gives rise to some fascinating conversations and some excellent dialogue. The game's main designer, Chris Avellone, was also the creator of possibly the greatest computer roleplaying game ever made, Planescape: Torment, and KotOR II covers some of the same ground as that earlier game. Avellone has a good claim to being the best writer of dialogue for computer RPGs around at the moment, and examples of that can be found throughout KotOR II.

It's an interesting approach and KotOR II does have a unique atmosphere and feel to it. Lightsabres and the Force aside, its dark story about challenging moral simplicity and questioning identity feels like it's come from some other universe altogether. This is also possibly the game's key weakness: Empire Strikes Back may have been an altogether more sophisticated take on Star Wars than the first movie but it still retained the core humour and warmth of the character relationships and still 'felt' like Star Wars. Matt Stover's novel Traitor, often heralded as another successful 'dark' take on Star Wars, also succeeds in retaining that core identity despite going to places George Lucas would be very uncomfortable with. KotOR II often fails to uphold that identity, and its coldness and lack of humour sometimes makes it hard going, especially compared to the manner in which KotOR I nailed those elements so successfully.

A major success of KotOR II is how it handles your party. In the first game it was possible to simply keep picking the first two NPCs you meet at the start of the game and take them through the whole game, missing out on the storylines of the other members of party. Whilst it is broadly possible to do this in the sequel, there are several quests which take place simultaneously, so you have to pick a second party from your character pool and have them doing stuff at the same time as your 'star party' is on a mission, which is an interesting and refreshing approach that gets as much of the plot as possible on screen and really gets into the characters across in a more interesting manner.

Unfortunately, this is slightly problematic as the NPCs in the second game are not quite as interesting as those in the first. They are fairly low-key in personality and the fact that they are a depressed and brooding bunch who have often committed horrible crimes makes empathising with them hard. The writing is excellent and eventually these characters' motivations are made clear, but they lack the vital personalities of characters such as Zaalbar, Mission and Bastila from the first game (although there is a brilliant inversion of the 'cute' Zaalbar/Mission, tough Wookie/smartass sidekick dynamic from the first game).

"If you seek to aid everyone that suffers in the galaxy, you will only weaken yourself… and weaken them. It is the internal struggles, when fought and won on their own, that yield the strongest rewards. You stole that struggle from them, cheapened it. If you care for others, then dispense with pity and sacrifice and recognize the value in letting them fight their own battles. And when they triumph, they will be even stronger for the victory."
- The Dark Lords of the Sith, apprently followers of Ayn Rand

Nevertheless, the game's story unfolds in a consistently intriguing manner, with enough mystery and plot development to drag you through its bumps. The game skirts against true masterpiece status a few times towards the end of the game through an impressively-executed plot twist (although not on the level of the central twist in the first game), but then things start falling apart again towards the end of the game. This time the problems have a far more straightforward explanation: LucasArts wanted the game released for Christmas 2004 no matter what, and denied Obsidian Entertainment the extra time needed to finish the game off properly. The result is that the game is incomplete. The designers managed to do enough to tie off the primary storyline at least, so that tracks coherently, but several quests are simply not solvable and most of your NPC allies' individual character arcs are left hanging in mid-air, with a cheesy dialogue exchange at the end of the game explaining the fates of the other characters. Two characters are left in a life-or-death situation that is simply never resolved, and another character's solo quest is not implemented in the game at all. This means the end of the game is extremely abrupt with many loose ends left dangling. Obsidian made a heroic effort to solve some of these problems through post-release patches, but LucasArts denied them the funding to actually finish the game through a content expansion.

As a result, what could have been (despite its slow opening) a five-star game and another classic is left wounded and broken. It's actually a tribute to the team at Obsidian that the game remains playable and compelling despite this significant problem. A mod team have been working for some time on restoring and completing the abandoned content (made possible thanks to Obsidian cheekily putting all the half-finished stuff on the game CD-ROMs for this specific purpose) which could immensely improve the game, but no release date has been set for this so far, and since it is now five years after release it is arguable if there is much point to it any more.

Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords (****) is a fascinating, compelling and altogether different take on Star Wars. It is intelligent, philosophical and refreshingly well-written for a computer game, although it doesn't skimp on the action and combat sequences either. However, a dull opening sequence and the incomplete content does leave the game feeling distinctly unfulfilling, especially compared to its near-flawlessly-executed forebear. The game is available now on the PC** (UK, USA) and X-Box (UK, USA) and a sequel, The Old Republic, is currently in development by BioWare.

* Although you can determine your character's gender, race and abilities, Lucasfilm has decreed that for canon purposes the main character in Knights of the Old Republic was male and your character in Knights of the Old Republic II was female.

** I would very, very strongly advise that those planning to purchase the game on PC download the two post-release patches, which are necessary to stabilise the game and eliminate its numerous bugs (once this is done the game is actually much smoother and easier to play on modern PCs than KotOR I) and also download the movie and music patches, which replace the horrible low-res movies and music from the original release. There's also an additional patch to run the game under Windows Vista as well.

Wertzone Classics: Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic

Four thousand years before the time of Vader and Palpatine, the Galaxy is divided by war. The mighty warrior-clans of the Mandalorians invaded the Galactic Republic and were thrown back by a fleet led by the Jedi warriors Revan and Malak. But, during that struggle, something happened to them and they fell to the dark side of the Force. Forging a powerful 'Sith Empire' out of their fleet and its conquests, they began a devastating war with the Republic, pushing them back on every front. The Jedi Knights have eliminated Revan, leaving his apprentice to take over, but the architect of that victory, the Jedi Bastila Shan, has been shot down over the planet Taris. Two Republic soldiers have to find and rescue her before Malak can finish the job and crush the Republic once and for all...

Better than Attack of the Clones and absolutely no Jar-Jar, 100% guaranteed.

Back in 1999, excitement for the new Star Wars movies was palpable. Fans were waiting excitedly to see the epic Clone Wars, the clash of entire armies of Jedi against the forces of evil, and the gripping tragedy of Anakin Skywalker's fall to the dark side. Instead, they got an extended toy commercial where genuine human conflict and drama was substituted for insane amounts of confusing and badly-choreographed CGI. By the time 2003 arrived, the ludicrous revelation that the Clone Wars was actually fought by an entire army of Boba Fetts against some very camp robots had destroyed whatever vestigal interest a lot of Star Wars fans had in the franchise.

It was thus surprising that it was a Star Wars game which became one of the most talked-about titles of the year. RPG stalwarts BioWare, creators of the legendary Baldur's Gate series, teamed up with Lucasfilm to produce the first-ever Star Wars computer roleplaying game. Declining the suggestion of setting the story during the Clone Wars (perhaps aware that the next movie would likely de-canonise anything major they chose to do), they went back four millennia into the distant past, to the time of the Sith and the Jedi, to the time covered in the popular Tales of the Jedi comic mini-series, and created a new story there.

Darth Malak, bringer of universal armageddon and giant space station headquarters/mechanical voicebox trend-setter.

Knights of the Old Republic's roaring success comes from it identifying with pinpoint accuracy all the things that make Star Wars great: memorable, strong characters, cool spaceships, a gripping plot, satisfying action and some great humour. They also did things that would likely give George Lucas a heart attack if he tried them: they added genuine moral ambiguity to the characters, they gave the player the choice of taking his or her character (and several others) down the dark side, and included intriguing moral debates over the Force itself (pointing out the very true fact that all we know of the 'dark side' in the movies comes from the hardly-unbiased 'light'-sworn Jedi). They also included the second-biggest twist in the entirety of Star Wars canon to date (outstripped only by the "I am your father," moment). They also borrowed some great ideas from the then-current New Jedi Order series of novels, such as ideas about a more dispassionate 'neutral' side of the Force and even a cameo mention of the Yuuzhan Vong. The result is what is easily the finest slice of Star Wars in any medium since The Empire Strikes Back (Matt Stover's Traitor possibly excepted).

Knights of the Old Republic sees you taking up the role of a Republic soldier marooned on the city-planet of Taris when your flagship is blown up. How you proceed is up to you, with you taking on jobs for profit as you attempt to track down the Jedi Bastila so you can get off-world. You can follow the light side by acting altruistically and honourably, or the dark side by threatening, murdering and blackmailing your way through the game. As the game continues you amass a number of sidekicks, some good, some bad, some somewhere inbetween, and build up complex relationships with them (including, interestingly, the potential for romance). It's this core cast of characters that, for starters, makes Knights so cool. Your sidekicks include the unfeasibly muderous assassin droid HK-47, the smart-alec street girl Mission, the disgraced wookie Zaalbar, the brutal Mandalorian warrior Canderous and several more, all superbly characterised and voice-acted. You also get your own ship, the Ebon Hawk, a badass smuggler's craft that gives the Millennium Falcon a serious run for its money as coolest ship in the Star Wars universe.

HK-47, a bit like Threepio except with less camp and more uncontrollable homicidal ultraviolence.

As the game continues the plot opens up. After the initial sequence on Taris, you spend most of the game travelling between several different worlds, including Tatooine (here presented at the very start of human settlement, with only a single small starport and the genesis of the some of the cultures that become dominant by the time of the films), the wookie homeworld of Kashyyyk, the water world of Manaan and the Sith tombworld of Korriban, not to mention the Jedi training enclave on Dantooine. As you roar back and forth between these worlds, carrying out missions, engaging in a bit of trade, fighting off Sith and criminals and pursuing the locations of the mysterious 'Star Maps' that may hold the key to the resolution of the war, your characters gain experience and their own backstories and mysteries come to the fore. The game is also highly replayable, as some missions only take place if you have a certain character or combination of characters in your party at any one time, and there are notably different endings depending on if you follow the dark or light side of the Force.

The game has aged well. The graphics, particularly on PC where they can now be rammed to the maximum on any decent modern-ish machine, are very good and the controls, although a little clunky due to the behind-the-shoulder 3D camera and limited field of view, generally work well. A lot of fun is had customising your character's armour and weapons for the best possible result. As the game is based on the pen-and-paper Star Wars RPG, which in turn is based on the D&D d20 system, the rules tend towards a curious favouring of melee combat which may be appropriate for lightsabre-wielding Jedi but would feel out of place elsewhere. Cleverly, BioWare use the fact that the game is set in a different era to set up a different culture of combat, with lightsabre-resistent cortosis blades and personal shields (reminiscent of those in Dune, although lacking their tendency to detonate in nuclear blasts) commonplace and thus duelling is still popular with warriors right across the galaxy. Voicework is also extremely impressive, particularly computer game veteren and BioWare regular Jennifer Hale as Bastila, who comes over as Princess Leia with a lightsabre, which is amusing.

The Sith flagship Leviathan, a typically understated and subtle piece of Star Wars starship design.

Perhaps inevitably, your character does show Force potential and later gains access to Force powers and the use of lightsabres in combat. If you decide to go down a combat-oriented gameplay path I strongly recommend creating a dual-wielding character right from the off, as they tend to be the most effective, and later equip your character with two lightsabres or one of those Darth Maul-style doubled-ended jobs for maximum impact.

Aside from the possible technical difficulties that come with any game more than a few years old (see below), there aren't many weaknesses. Sometimes you have to backtrack across quite large areas, which can get slightly tedious. The absence of a fast-travel system to cover already-explored territory is sometimes keenly felt. Other issues are really not Knights of the Old Republic's fault: at the time of its release its structure was quite fresh, but BioWare has reused many ideas from the game in later releases such as Jade Empire. Mass Effect in particular is something of a rehash of Knights in their own setting, but only about half the size, and suffers in comparison (although still a fine game compared to most titles out there). A more glaring problem is that one event in the game can leave a whole stack of quests uncompletable and you have no warning of it, meaning that if you don't have a handy save when it happens a good hour or so of game content can be rendered unreachable (although you can still complete the game without a problem). Also, and I'm really reaching here, the light side/dark side metre is open to ridiculous abuse, as you can behave like a total paragon for 90% of the game and then kill a couple of innocent people to open some interesting side-quests and you don't really get penalised for it. The only other thing that comes to mind is that although the game sticks a level cap on you (you can only get to Level 20 in the game), the last few locations in the game seem to assume you'll be four or five levels lower when you get there, making them quite easy to get through at Level 20.

None of these issues are really problematic, however, and are more down to technical constraints and the fact the game had to be scaled for both PCs and the X-Box at the same time, as well as the fact it was aimed at a more casual console-buying public as well as the hardcore PC RPG-player.

Knights of the Old Republic (*****) is a superbly-written, surprisingly morally complex and well-characterised RPG. It is one of the best slices of Star Wars of any stripe in existence, and would also rank as one of the best computer RPGs ever made. Star Wars fan or not, if you enjoy a good computer roleplaying game, you have to check this out. It is available now on PC (UK, USA), Mac (UK, USA) and X-Box (UK, USA).


Technical note: unfortunately, BioWare chose to use OpenGL as the game's graphics driver, which may not have been wise (D3D had won that battle several years earlier, making it a curious choice on their part) as modern graphics cards have a problem with that outmoded driver system. NVidia graphics card-owners can get around this quite easily, but those with ATI Radeon cards may find the game crashes frequently. Also, whilst the game works fine with Windows XP (which was current when it first came out), Vista owners may also experience headaches getting it to work, although it is doable and well worth the effort.