"A stimulating company that focuses on quality of life over speed of production."
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Work/Life Balance
Culture & Values
Career Opportunities
Comp & Benefits
Senior Management
Former Employee - Associate Designer in Austin, TX
Former Employee - Associate Designer in Austin, TX
Recommends
Neutral Outlook
Approves of CEO
I worked at BioWare full-time (More than a year)
Pros
Food, comfort, and happy people. BioWare is a comfortable place to work and a happy environment. You must find a healthy place in the corporate structure where creativity is allowed to thrive and corporate needs are sheltered by strong leads. There are some really creative people at BioWare, and it is an absolutely amazing environment to wet one's feet or season one's skills.
Cons
The large corporate mogul of EA opens doors but closes independent thought. Only on the micro-level may creativity thrive, for revolutionary ideas that can be iterated on rapidly in a small company setting turn into months-long trudge of certification, documentation, and stagnation. Long "assembly-line" like production pipelines turn great ideas into watered-down results, quashing the desire for creativity into production, as the outcome of both becomes identical.
Advice to Management
Decrease employee turnover to perfect their skills instead of firing and re-hiring temporary workers. Eliminate work-flow pipeline issues by seasoning your people and unifying your technology. It should not take 6 months for a new designer to learn the ropes, and another 6 to master them. That's 4 and 8 months too long, where employees are gratuitously unproductive in comparison to seasoned veterans. On top of that, the forced turnover rate eliminates many of the seasoned workers before they can share their wealth of accumulated knowledge, leading to a downward spiral of production that can only end in one way.
Former Employee - Anonymous Employee in Austin, TX
Former Employee - Anonymous Employee in Austin, TX
Doesn't Recommend
Negative Outlook
Approves of CEO
I worked at BioWare full-time (Less than a year)
Pros
Relaxed atmosphere, got to work with some brilliant people
Cons
Really makes me sad to see what's happened to this company. Only worked there for a short time before the layoffs started, but long enough to see what the problems are. Marketing is driving the business into the ground, making initiatives that make no sense. It's as if they don't realize their audience is gamers, and that's a fail right there.
Management simply doesn't listen to the brilliant folks there. I don't know how many times I walked from a meeting shaking my head in complete confusion as to why rational common sense ideas were thrown out in favor of what the marketing head thought was best.
I don't believe all game companies are run like this, even BioWare's other branches. But when you have EA looming over your shoulder insisting to see immediate increases in subscriber numbers yet cutting funding in all departments, coupled with horrible management, all the while listening to the marketing department instead of your core audience... yeah. You can see where that's going.
Advice to Management
Listen to the very vocal, and very talented, people who AREN'T management. Take their ideas to heart and realize that not only are they your workers, but they also are your audience. Realize marketing has its place, but its place is NOT in making decisions that shape the company.
BioWare
Part of Electronic ArtsSee Most Recent
Helpful (5)
"A stimulating company that focuses on quality of life over speed of production."
I worked at BioWare full-time (More than a year)
Pros
Food, comfort, and happy people. BioWare is a comfortable place to work and a happy environment. You must find a healthy place in the corporate structure where creativity is allowed to thrive and corporate needs are sheltered by strong leads. There are some really creative people at BioWare, and it is an absolutely amazing environment to wet one's feet or season one's skills.
Cons
The large corporate mogul of EA opens doors but closes independent thought. Only on the micro-level may creativity thrive, for revolutionary ideas that can be iterated on rapidly in a small company setting turn into months-long trudge of certification, documentation, and stagnation. Long "assembly-line" like production pipelines turn great ideas into watered-down results, quashing the desire for creativity into production, as the outcome of both becomes identical.
Advice to Management
Decrease employee turnover to perfect their skills instead of firing and re-hiring temporary workers. Eliminate work-flow pipeline issues by seasoning your people and unifying your technology. It should not take 6 months for a new designer to learn the ropes, and another 6 to master them. That's 4 and 8 months too long, where employees are gratuitously unproductive in comparison to seasoned veterans. On top of that, the forced turnover rate eliminates many of the seasoned workers before they can share their wealth of accumulated knowledge, leading to a downward spiral of production that can only end in one way.
BioWare Response
seconds ago
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Helpful (10)
"Management needs to get their act together + EA = Not Good"
I worked at BioWare full-time (Less than a year)
Pros
Relaxed atmosphere, got to work with some brilliant people
Cons
Really makes me sad to see what's happened to this company. Only worked there for a short time before the layoffs started, but long enough to see what the problems are. Marketing is driving the business into the ground, making initiatives that make no sense. It's as if they don't realize their audience is gamers, and that's a fail right there.
Management simply doesn't listen to the brilliant folks there. I don't know how many times I walked from a meeting shaking my head in complete confusion as to why rational common sense ideas were thrown out in favor of what the marketing head thought was best.
I don't believe all game companies are run like this, even BioWare's other branches. But when you have EA looming over your shoulder insisting to see immediate increases in subscriber numbers yet cutting funding in all departments, coupled with horrible management, all the while listening to the marketing department instead of your core audience... yeah. You can see where that's going.
Advice to Management
Listen to the very vocal, and very talented, people who AREN'T management. Take their ideas to heart and realize that not only are they your workers, but they also are your audience. Realize marketing has its place, but its place is NOT in making decisions that shape the company.
BioWare Response
seconds ago
Edit • DeleteHelpful (1)
"It is truly a learning experience"
I have been working at BioWare full-time
Pros
You can learn a lot about the game industry.
Cons
The game industry is based on people's extra income and as that shrinks, so does the studio.
Advice to Management
In order to be a designer you need to play the games you design.
BioWare Response
seconds ago
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