Zeschuk leaves Star Wars: The Old Republic dev (Updated)

A rumor has started circulating that BioWare doc Greg Zeschuk has left the Austin studio responsible for the struggling Star Wars: The Old Republic MMO to move back to Edmonton and spend more time with his family.

John Keefer

August 10, 2012 7:30 AM

BioWare doc Greg Zeschuk has left the Austin studio responsible for the struggling Star Wars: The Old Republic MMO to move back to Edmonton and spend more time with his family and think about other projects. His successor is already in place and Zeschuk will continue to work for publisher Electronic Arts.

Zeschuk

Zeschuk told Gamasutra that Matthew Bromberg, former head of Major League Gaming, is taking his place, which is supported by his LinkedIn profile. "I handed off the leadership of the studio to Matthew Bromberg quite some time ago (back in May). Ray and I picked Matthew to take over and he's been doing a great job with the studio. My time in Austin was always planned to have a finite endpoint (my family was still living in Edmonton throughout my time in Austin) and now that I've handed the baton to Matt, I will be able to spend more time on a wider range of BioWare games rather than focusing on just one as I did with SWTOR." An Electronic Arts representative told GamersGlobal (via Videogamer) that Zeschuk wanted to go back home for an extended vacation when the developer was reorganized back in May. "Greg is still with EA," the EA rep said. "He's now back in Canada, taking time off and thinking about new projects. No change with [BioWare co-founder] Ray Muzyka." GamersGlobal's sources also said the BioWare Austin team is afraid it may loses its BioWare identity and become EA Austin amid mounting "internal pressure." Subscriptions for The Old Republic have dropped below 1 million, and the game is going free-to-play to try to bring back many of the players that have moved on. While EA has said the game is still above the break-even point of 500,000 subscribers, it has termed the game's performance "disappointing."

John Keefer

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August 10, 2012 7:30 AM

John Keefer posted a new article, Rumor: Zeschuk leaves Star Wars: The Old Republic dev.

A rumor has started circulating that BioWare doc Greg Zeschuk has left the Austin studio responsible for the struggling Star Wars: The Old Republic MMO to move back to Edmonton and spend more time with his family.
- FreshwaterAU
  
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  August 10, 2012 7:33 AM
  
  The ship be sinking
- phate81
  
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  August 10, 2012 7:43 AM
  
  The "spending more time with my family" excuse is code for "this job sucks and Im quitting"
  - Arcanum
    
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    August 10, 2012 7:48 AM
    
    Or, if you're a politician, "I got caught doing something immoral, so I'm quitting rather than dealing with media crap forever".
    - TheMongbat
      
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      August 10, 2012 8:35 AM
      
      I took it as "Now go home and think about what you've done, and what you can do to make it up to us!"
      
      Of course, I have no idea what level of responsibility he really had for direction, so my opinion is not worth much.
- bobbyknc
  
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  August 10, 2012 7:57 AM
  
  They had the makings of a mighty, independent studio like Valve and Epic. Their decision to be bought by Elevation partners (which then included the current CEO of EA... funny how that all worked out) and then Elevation selling them to EA looks like the beginning of the end. Looking back it seems to me that even EA hasn't been the same since they bough Bioware/Pandemic from Elevation Partners and the Elevation Partners CEO moved into be EA CEO, John Riccitiello.
  
  Or course the hubris of trying to develop a Star Wars MMO (let alone one based on an original Xbox franchise) is what will ultimately do in Bioware as an entity inside EA, I believe. One Doc leaving is only the tip of the iceberg I believe.
  
  If EA thinks the Bioware brand is tarnished and they rebrand the Austin studio, its only a matter of time before Bioware as an entity disappears inside EA.
  
  Of course I could be wrong and Doc Greg probably left because its so FREAKING HOT here in TX and as a Canadian he just couldn't handle it .
- Keefinator
  
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  August 10, 2012 8:09 AM
  
  Story updated to confirmed via Gamasutra.
  - [deleted] 439710436
    
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    August 10, 2012 8:09 AM
    
    [deleted]
  - SkipperMcG
    
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    August 10, 2012 2:02 PM
    
    Nothing hear smells fishy to me. Guy moved down to Austin temporarily to oversee the mmo completion permanently and now he is moving home. Honestly, the appointment of an MLG exec to run a game studio is more alarming to me.
- jimvolk
  
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  August 10, 2012 8:12 AM
  
  Once SWTOR shuts down, does anyone think we'll ever see another Star Wars MMO? If Bioware couldn't make it work, I don't know who else could.
  - MercFox1
    
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    August 10, 2012 8:14 AM
    
    No and I hope to god no other studio tries.
  - geedeck
    
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    August 10, 2012 8:15 AM
    
    Sure. History has a lot of years left in it. When? A long time tho.
  - Jonathan
    
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    August 10, 2012 8:30 AM
    
    I would be surprised if SWTOR shuts down without another Star Wars MMO on the horizon.
  - snot3353
    
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    August 10, 2012 8:32 AM
    
    I think traditional MMO's are pretty much done for. By that I mean "WoW/EQ clone" MMO's. We will probably see Star Wars MP games again in the future but they won't be like SWG or SWTOR.
    - Jonathan
      
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      August 10, 2012 8:36 AM
      
      I've always assume that companies would start backdooring their MMOs (start with a persistent but focused game and then expand to a fuller MMO) but beyond World of Tanks and Eve/Dust 514 I haven't really seen it.
  - walker270
    
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    August 10, 2012 8:37 AM
    
    SWTOR won't be shut down any time soon.
  - Zek
    
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    August 10, 2012 8:55 AM
    
    For that matter, I wonder how much longer Star Wars even has as a heavy-hitter IP? Not to suggest that TOR is killing the franchise, it just isn't getting any younger. Kids like the prequels but soon those will be old movies by kid standards.
    - kagath
      
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      August 10, 2012 9:03 AM
      
      Nah, Lucas still plans on the 3D versions last I knew. There'll probably be another cartoon at some point I would guess and maybe even that TV show at some point. Spaced out enough and he could make it last for a while yet. He says he's done with stuff and stepping away but look what he did to movies he was done with before.
    - Jonathan
      
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      August 10, 2012 9:08 AM
      
      I think hope three things will happen - The Clone Wars cartoon will carry a new generation for about 2-3 more years, The 3D re-release will stretch that out to 5-7 years. At about 10 years someone will do another remaster effort and present the Original trilogy because as much as Lucas abuses the films by making them ILM tech research project and demos at some point the value of releasing the Originals remastered will outweigh the value of yet another release with another pixel changed.
      - razorblade79
        
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        August 10, 2012 9:24 AM
        
        the originals are gone. the special edition is all anyone could start to work from.
        
        Jonathan
        
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        August 10, 2012 9:49 AM
        
        LOL. Yeah I've heard that line before and it's bullshit. I'm not saying that Lucas didn't willfully destroy the material used to create the special editions but the idea that a restoration effort couldn't provide a cleaned, reasonably colour corrected, anamorphic transfer is silly.
        
        disembodied potato
        
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        August 10, 2012 12:12 PM
        
        They'll remake the original trilogy when lucas is dead.
    - FreshwaterAU
      
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      August 10, 2012 9:29 AM
      
      an old republic movie is planned anyway with ron pearlman as canderous. It'll come back
      - thetangent
        
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        August 10, 2012 11:35 AM
        
        I'd be first in line for this.
    - cptstern
      
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      August 10, 2012 9:34 AM
      
      there's always clone wars and lego games to keep them interested. I for one would be happy if the star wars IP died down a bit. it's over saturated
  - FreshwaterAU
    
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    August 10, 2012 9:28 AM
    
    no chance, it'd be suicide
  - [deleted] 1737240303
    
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    August 10, 2012 12:09 PM
    
    [deleted]
- action wombmate
  
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  August 10, 2012 8:14 AM
  
  I haven't played this, but based on what I've heard about it, it sounds like it's a decent game that might have done better had it come out 2-4 years ago when people still weren't quite burned out on WoW-style MMOs. I played WoW for a solid 5 years and enjoyed it, but after my time with it I think I'm pretty much done with that kind of gaming for a long time, if not for the rest of my life.
  - phate81
    
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    August 10, 2012 8:17 AM
    
    If you play it as KOTOR 3 then it's a decent game. As an MMO it falls flat on its face and there isn't much reason to subscribe.
    - vertdang
      
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      August 10, 2012 8:36 AM
      
      This exactly. It's a good game, but it's not good enough to warrant an ongoing subscription.
      - Jonathan
        
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        August 10, 2012 8:40 AM
        
        The biggest problem I have right now is that it doesn't look like EA is interested in adding enough polish to make it worth a second look beyond the F2P relaunch. They fluffed the features for the launch (it was basically short of 3-6 months more work) and I've not seen anything to suggest they aren't going to drop the ball for the relaunch.
- Firefly1985
  
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  August 10, 2012 8:31 AM
  
  I've liked the more recent Bioware stuff, but I would definitely buy anything some of these OG Bioware people make if they went off and started a new dev.
- Sexpansion Pack
  
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  August 10, 2012 9:21 AM
  
  http://www.dan-dare.org/dan%20saber/DeathStarExplodeAni.gif
- Sgt_Boomstick
  
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  August 10, 2012 9:22 AM
  
  This probably for the best.
- fried sushi
  
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  August 10, 2012 9:30 AM
  
  Sounds like he is still with Bioware just going back to the Edmonton studio? Maybe a good thing for Bioware as a whole if they can focus on the stronger franchises.
- Rice-Rocketeer
  
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  August 10, 2012 10:00 AM
  
  Welcome home, Greg.
- wytefang
  
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  August 10, 2012 10:24 AM
  
  Hopefully this will let other publishers realize that MMOs just need to be a lot better in order to even bother with...
- squeakychimp
  
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  August 10, 2012 11:59 AM
  
  why does shacknews hate swtor?
  - [deleted] 1737240303
    
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    August 10, 2012 12:08 PM
    
    [deleted]
- saturn96
  
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  August 10, 2012 12:11 PM
  
  Just uninstalled SWTOR off my system. I don't think their F2P model is going to be worth coming back for. All those years of anticipation on a SW Galaxies successor down the drain.
- xTwizzlerx
  
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  August 13, 2012 8:11 PM
  
  I think the new changes were wise. Now the dedicated player base has perks to keep them playing, which will give the developers a steady flow of revenue for profit and for further development. And, frankly, since most of the players were probably casual anyway, now the fear of being tied down to a subscription won't deter them. But I don't think this will be enough to save the game :-/ The project was too large to only be sustained by a small, dedicated player base. They've already had to downsize the development team.