BioWare defends developer from online abuse

One member of BioWare’s development team has found themselves the centre of a new online abuse campaign.

A notorious right wing blog published a piece claiming that Allie Rose-Marie Leost – yes, of course it’s a woman who has been targeted – was solely responsible for the much criticised animations in the new Mass Effect game.

Leost was identified by a blog as the game’s lead facial animator, thus the internet descended. In truth, she actually works on EA Vancouver’s motion capture labs. However, this was not enough to stop her enduring a torrent of online hate on the back of obviously unfounded accusations.

"Recently, a former EA employee was misidentified as a lead member of the Mass Effect: Andromeda development team. These reports are false,” BioWare’s general manager Aaryn Flynn

"We respect the opinions of our players and community, and welcome feedback on our games. But attacking individuals, regardless of their involvement in the project, is never acceptable."

BioWare was sadly always a likely target for such campaigns thanks to its progressive attitudes toward sexuality and gender equality.

Even this morning it found itself at the centre of another storm after the Mass Effect Andromeda review embargo lifted, with the press being accused of scoring the game too highly. Detractors argue that the reviews themselves are even more scathing than the scores reflect, leading to accusations that ‘big sites’ aren’t willing to score triple-A games poorly. Why? For reasons. Direct your browser to the usual suspect message boards to learn about them.

As Kotaku reports, this is not the first time a female BioWare employee has faced such treatment. In 2012, Dragon Age writer Jennifer Helper was attacked aver comments she made about the relationship between narrative and gameplay.

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— BioWare (@bioware) March 18, 2017