Writer Drew Karpyshyn has announced his retirement from BioWare for a second time, to pursue other projects.

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Karpyshyn, who has previously worked on Mass Effect, Mass Effect 2, and Star Wars: The Old Republic, announced the news on his website The writer initially left BioWare Austin in 2012, to work on The Chaos Born trilogy , a series of fantasy books released between 2013 and 2015. He returned to the studio in 2015 once the series was complete, to work on Star Wars: The Old Republic."I know a lot of you are wondering why I’m doing this", he wrote on his blog. "For many people, working at BioWare would be their dream job and they can’t imagine anyone stepping away from it. But it was time for me to move on."Everyone who works at BioWare pours their heart and soul into the games they are making. It’s creatively demanding and – at times – exhausting. In the past, I’ve managed to juggle outside projects with my work at BioWare, but it always took a toll. And there were always outside projects I had to pass on because they would represent a conflict of interest with BioWare or EA properties."Karpyshyn won't be leaving the industry altogether. He will now be writing in a freelance capacity, first for FoxNext Games' new studio, Fogbank Entertainment, where he will be working alongside former BioWare writers Alex Freed and Daniel Erickson.The studio's current project is described only as an "episodic narrative game, which will draw from story, character, and location elements based on acclaimed Fox intellectual property as well as original content."As for what Karpyshyn had been working on at BioWare recently, he remains tight-lipped. Karpyshyn had previously confirmed that he was working on the upcoming Anthem, but won't be drawn on exactly what that entailed. "Just because I’ve left BioWare doesn’t mean I’m going to start blabbing all their secrets", he wrote.

Shabana is a freelance writer who enjoys JRPGs, wine, and not finishing games. Follow her on Twitter and Instagram