To say the video game industry has been on very shaky ground in recent years would be an understatement. Unfortunately, it feels like every month we hear that massive layoffs have impacted many developers, and October 2026 was no different. EA closed its flagship studio, BioWare, laying off approximately 50 employees, while reports suggest another 350 jobs across the company will eventually be cut.
Unfortunately, BioWare's closure means work on the upcoming Mass Effect 5 has effectively been halted, and the revered studio won't get a chance at redemption after a streak of projects that were met with mixed reviews. Now, many questions remain about the franchise's future, especially since EA still owns the IP but has no one actively working on it.
If we were to look at the company's track record, things don't look very promising. EA closed Visceral Games—better known for creating Dead Space—back in 2017. The horror saga was then put on hold for multiple years until a remake of the first Dead Space title was released in 2023 by Motive Studio. Since then, there have been no announcements about another potential title in the saga. So, could a similar fate await Mass Effect?
While there are many unknowns for the time being, one thing seems certain: We'll still watch a Mass Effect adaptation on the small screen despite the recent layoffs.
Prime Video's Mass Effect TV series is still in the works
As reported by IGN, Amazon MGM Studios is still developing a Mass Effect show, and all the creatives previously involved in the project are still attached. That means Doug Jung, who wrote the screenplay for Star Trek Beyond (2016) and Mindhunter, should still be the showrunner. Moreover, the adaptation is set to have a script from Daniel Casey, who wrote F9: The Fast Saga, the ninth installment of the long-running Fast & Furious franchise.
Very little is known about the Mass Effect show. However, Mike Gamble, former Executive Producer at BioWare, revealed in a blog post that it won't be an adaptation of Commander Shepard's trilogy:
"The show will explore a brand-new story within the universe's timeline, and will be set after the original trilogy. It won't be a retread of Commander Shepard's story – because after all … that's YOUR story, isn't it?"
Originally, Amazon MGM Studios intended to begin principal photography for the Mass Effect show in Q4 2026, although this plan didn't come to fruition. Moreover, the series has no official release date yet, and it remains unclear whether BioWare's closure will delay production in any manner. After all, Mike Gamble was originally set to be a producer on the show, but he was recently affected by the EA layoffs.
For the time being, the Mass Effect Prime Video series is the last project confirmed to be released as part of the franchise. If the show is a critical and commercial success, chances are EA will look to either hand the saga to another one of its in-house studios or sell it to another company altogether. On the other hand, if the show fails to meet expectations, then the IP could simply be buried for a long time. So even if it does not appear at first sight, the success of Prime Video's Mass Effect could be instrumental in determining what's next for the saga.
Interestingly, Mike Gamble once confirmed that Prime Video's Mass Effect is canon to the games, and that the creative team was trying to figure out "where it sits in respect" to the now-defunct Mass Effect 5. With that in mind, there's a small chance that the show could give us a small glimpse of what BioWare had planned for its video game franchise. And with a bit of luck, this final chapter will close things with a bang (and hopefully not get canceled along the way).
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