Development has now ceased on Bioware’s Anthem, EA has confirmed.

A 2.0 project – entitled Anthem NEXT – was announced a year ago and since then it has been assumed BioWare have been working hard to try and reverse the game’s fortunes.

It seems, however, that time is up and the studio will instead commit their full focus on the latest Dragon Age and Mass Effect games, both of which have now been announced.

BioWare had been providing updates to the community throughout the year, talking about planned features and even giving them a first look at the UI.

The game’s fate was unfortunately sealed earlier this month, as EA were reported to be holding a meeting to look at the work being done on the game. It appears the decision was made to cancel it entirely.

The COVID-19 pandemic has caused many challenges for the game’s development and productivity and Christian Dailey admitted that ‘not eveything we had planned as a studio before COVID-19 can be accomplished without putting undue stress on our teams’.

It’s a difficult decision for all parties and heartbreaking to developers who spent so much time building something that will now, ultimately, probably never be seen. The fans can at least take some solace in the fact that their ‘suggestions most certainly (did) help shape the team’s direction.’

We wish all of the team well as they now turn their attention to Dragon Age and say goodbye to Anthem, a game that seemed to offer so much potential, but sadly, never quite realised it.