Even if you don't know his name, you likely know of Drew Karpyshyn's contributions to gaming. At BioWare, he contributed to series like Baldur's Gate, Knights of the Old Republic, Jade Empire, and Mass Effect. Karpyshyn broke away from the company shortly after the release of Mass Effect 2 to focus on his Chaos Born trilogy of novels, but has now returned from whence he came.
"As of this past week, I am back working at BioWare again!" Karpyshyn wrote on his blog over the weekend. "I suspect a lot of folks are going to wonder if this means BioWare is about to announce a new project tied to my return. The short answer: no. I originally came to the Austin studio many years ago to work on SWTOR and – at least for now – that’s what I’m focusing on again."
Curiously, eagle-eyed fans have noticed that Chris Schlerf, the previously-announced lead writer of Mass Effect: Andromeda, was recently dropped from a BioWare blog post introducing the development team leads. That doesn't mean Karpyshyn will be taking up the role, but with his specific mention that BioWare won't be announcing a new project plus the caveat of "for now" in his blog, it's hard not to wonder what it means for the future of The Old Republic and Mass Effect.
I have to say, this news is a bit of an emotional rollercoaster; the lead writer of KOTOR and Mass Effect 1 & 2 is back at BioWare (yay!) and he's working on SWTOR (oh), but the possibility is open for other projects (yay again?). I need a dialogue wheel to decide how I feel about this.
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