EA has introduced it is going to shut down BioWare's Anthem on January 12, 2026.
Because Anthem's solely content material is online, this implies the game can be unplayable after that date.
Premium in-game currency will stop being bought immediately, July 3, although present balances will nonetheless have the ability to be used till Anthem shuts down. The game can be faraway from EA Play on August 15, 2025, however will nonetheless be out there for obtain if it's already in your library till it formally shuts down.
Anthem launched in February of 2019 to lukewarm reviews, including our own 6.5/10 which criticized the grindiness, lack of polish and selection, and a mismatched story. The game had bought 5 million copies as of December of 2023, which fell short of EA's goal of 6 million copies in the primary few months. Though EA continued to replace and improve Anthem in the months that adopted its launch, in February of 2021, EA ceased active development on the game. The following month, its game director departed the company.
In an FAQ, EA acknowledged that no layoffs occurred on the firm because the outcome of Anthem's sundown. This will come as a reduction, on condition that EA has undergone a quantity of huge staffing cuts in the previous couple of years which have left workers reeling.
In May, EA shut down Cliffhanger Games and canceled its in-development Black Panther game, laying off an unknown number of individuals in the process. That identical month, it applied mandatory return-to-office for all workers.
Just the month earlier than, EA laid off roughly 300 people, and nonetheless earlier this 12 months EA restructured Anthem developer BioWare, moving some developers to other projects and laying off others. That was all simply in 2025. Last 12 months, EA underwent a huge restructuring that resulted in 670 workers laid off company-wide, and the 12 months earlier than that in 2023, 50 individuals were laid off at BioWare and an unknown number of others were cut at Codemasters.
As for BioWare, it's presently absolutely targeted on Mass Effect 5 after the gross sales failure of Dragon Age: The Veilguard.
Rebekah Valentine is a senior reporter for IGN. You can discover her posting on BlueSky @duckvalentine.bsky.social. Got a story tip? Send it to [email protected].