It's been almost 15 years since BioWare co-founders Greg Zeschuk and Ray Muzyka announced their retirements from the videogame industry, and they've been resolute about staying out of it ever since: Muzyka continues to head up the ThresholdImpact investment firm he founded in 2012 and holds multiple roles at the University of Alberta, while Zeschuk owns Blind Enthusiasm Brewing Company, also based in Alberta, where he works with a small handful of other BioWare veterans.

But Zeschuk stepped back into the videogame spotlight, briefly, following last week's closure of BioWare by parent company Electronic Arts, telling 80lv that he got the news hours after it happened because he was on a fishing trip, and by the time he flew home a couple days later, he'd "already shelved it away."

"I wasn't there to share in the moment, which in some ways was nice because I was able to kind of just take my time with it," Zeschuk said. "I’m not saying it doesn't hurt and doesn't suck. And I think it's kind of sad. It's actually, in some ways, saddest for the city of Edmonton, where we're from, because we were kind of this beacon of hope and excitement and possibility. We showed you could do something really special in a place that was not known for doing things like that."

Zeschuk said he had his own "emotional moment" about BioWare years ago, when he left the company; his real concern now is for the people at the studio who now find themselves out of work: "Anyone getting put into the job hunt is a sort of terrifying endeavor and super sad."

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