James Ohlen, a former BioWare developer who also worked as director of the popular MMO Star Wars: The Old Republic, spoke recently with PC Gamer where he discussed his time working on games and why he left Archetype Entertainment, a studio made up of former BioWare devs who are working on Exodus, an ambitious Mass Effect-like project that involves the likes of even Matthew McConaughey.
Ohlen describes the ups and downs of his time working in video games, including his 22-year career with BioWare where he worked on the likes of Baldur’s Gate, Neverwinter Nights, and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. His success as lead designer Knights of the Old Republic would earn him the role of overseeing the then new BioWare Austin studio where he’d work on The Old Republic, although in his interview he stated, “I was like, ‘I hate massive multiplayer games. But all right, I’ll do it””. Ohlen describes a conversation with his wife, where he said, “It’ll be an adventure, we’ll only be there for a year.”, but this ended up not being the case, describing the project as “never-ending” and where his main task was to empower others and make sure “big ego designers … didn’t kill each other”. Ohlen did not particularly enjoy the end result of the project, feeling it strayed too far from his vision of an online Knights of the Old Republic and into a Star Wars-themed World of Warcraft. “I’m just not someone who can manage hundreds and hundreds of people to go in a different direction … everyone wants to build WoW in space, and it’s my job to say no, we’re making [something different], and I wasn’t able to do that.”
Ohlen would attempt a reboot in 2015 with his proposed idea for Star Wars: The New Republic, which aimed to take the franchise to a time period similar to the original Star Wars expanded universe’s “High Republic” period. He even got approval from Kathleen Kennedy and Dave Filoni, and eventually the then-EA chief design officer Patrick Söderlund, which he says was “one of the greatest accomplishments of my career” given Söderlund’s dislike of The Old Republic. EA’s board of directors however did not approve of the game, still upset over spending $300 million on The Old Republic, and would end up cancelling the project. “That was the beginning of the end for me (…) The only way you get through life is by having empathy for everybody, including people that are causing you pain. I was thinking of it through the lens of EA. And I’m like, there’s no way I’m ever going to win in this. It just doesn’t make sense to empower someone like me. If I was there, I wouldn’t. So I gotta get out. This is just not for me”.
Ohlen would go on to work with other former BioWare devs at Archetype Entertainment, but eventually he would leave during the production of their still being-game Exodus. “I was running on fumes, and it was hurting my health, and my personal life, and everything. I just needed to step away (…) As a creative you care about everything so much, and then as the head of the studio, you have to be cutting the baby in half all the time, and having people attack your vision constantly. I definitely wouldn’t put myself in that situation again; that’s not a healthy place to be.” As of now, Ohlen is writing numerous RPG-adventure books alongside former Archetype and BioWare colleague Jesse Sky, the current creative director of Exodus.