Following the departure of BioWare's former general manager Casey Hudson and Dragon Age executive producer Mark Darrah, EA leadership is reassuring investors that it is "very, very confident" in the studio's future.

During the company's Q3 earnings call today, CEO Andrew Wilson responded to a question from an investor about the recent departures by praising BioWare, while simultaneously acknowledging criticism over the studio's output in recent years.

"I think that from the outside world there have been some blips in [BioWare's] delivery over the last couple of years, but that has come as a result of them pushing deeply into innovation and creativity, and we feel very, very confident about their future roadmap," he said. "And we've talked about games like Dragon Age and Mass Effect in their future.

"With respect to Casey and Mark leaving, both good friends of mine, and we have tremendous respect for both of them. But this happens in the natural course of creative organizations from time to time, and we feel very very good about the ongoing leadership of that studio."

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Hudson and Darrah departed the studio in December, leaving Samantha Ryan in charge of the studio as a whole, Christian Dailey in the role of Dragon Age executive producer, Matthew Goldman staying as creative director on the same project, and Mike Gamble remaining as the lead on Mass Effect: Legendary Edition.

Today, Mass Effect: Legendary Edition received an official release date for May, and you can read our early impressions of the trilogy collection here.

BioWare is also currently working on a new Mass Effect project with a "veteran team," as well as Dragon Age 4 -- which received a new cinematic trailer at The Game Awards in December.

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Rebekah Valentine is a news reporter with IGN. You can find her on Twitter @duckvalentine.

EA is hoping that its planned acquisition of British racing game maker Codemasters will enable it to start releasing a new racing game every year, on par with its other EA Sports franchises.

In a slide deck accompanying the publisher's Q3 financial results today, EA highlighted the motivations behind its pending acquisition, including the desire to increase its presence in racing, with EA CEO Andrew Wilson describing the sport as "one of the few truly global sports" during the company's earnings call.

EA's presentation further outlined Codemasters' IP line-up, which includes owned IP Dirt, Dirt Rally, Grid, Project Cars, and upcoming mobile franchise Project Cars Go, as well as licensed IP F1 and upcoming licensed games for World Rally Championship beginning in 2023.

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These would be added to EA's owned racing franchises Need for Speed and Burnout Paradise, as well as Real Racing -- which hasn't had a new game launch since Real Racing 3 in 2013.

Later in the earnings call, COO Blake Jorgensen praised the viability of F1 racing in particular as a global franchise currently gaining further traction in the US, suggesting that EA hopes to become the go-to publisher for racing games more broadly, saying the genre is "one of the best growth opportunities there is."

"On top of the fact that the Dirt Franchise, the Grid franchise, all of their franchises are incredible games, but none of them are actually taking advantage of a large publishing organization and the marketing muscle that we are able to deliver. And we think that has growth to it. Not to mention, the talent that can continue to help our Need for Speed business or our Real Racing business could be very powerful. So we know it is not a FIFA-sized business, but we know there is an incredible opportunity to own essentially all the driving business there is."

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Wilson added that EA also sees an opportunity with Codemasters' titles to incorporate further live service elements, saying that "F1 plus live service plus our marketing muscle is a profound opportunity."

This comes alongside a further statement from Wilson during the earnings call, stating EA's intent to expand EA Sports into different types of sports, with more announcements planned "in the weeks and months ahead." Wilson added that this includes "at least one new experience" launching next fiscal year -- which begins April 2021.

EA announced its intent to acquire Codemasters earlier this month for an approximate price of $1.2 billion, which was initially in contest with a $1 billion offer from Take-Two Interactive before the latter retracted its offer. The acquisition is expected to complete in Q1 of 2021, or between April and June of this year, and is currently pending a shareholder vote from Codemasters.

Codemasters launched Dirt 5 in November of last year as a launch title for the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S. Our review called it "a complete about-face" for the franchise, and an "unabashed, arcade-inspired racing experience."

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Rebekah Valentine is a reporter for IGN.

EA has spoken at length that a new Battlefield game will be released in 2021 with a reveal planned for Spring. Today during EA’s latest financial call, the company reaffirmed this timeline and says the next Battlefield game will take “full” advantage of next-gen platforms. During the latest EA investor call, EA CEO Andrew Wilson confirmed the next Battlefield game will be released on holiday this year and a reveal is planned for Spring. During the Q&A portion, Wilson shared more details on the next Battlefield, short of a reveal. When asked about the next Battlefield game, Wilson says it will utilize the “full power of next-gen platforms to ensure this is ‘exactly’ the game that Battlefield fans want to play.” [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=every-ign-battlefield-review&captions=true"] Wilson also says that the next Battlefield will be a return to “full-out military warfare” and will support more players than ever before. The hope is for the next Battlefield game to pave the way for the series into the future. A lot is riding on the next Battlefield game. Battlefield 5 was the last game in the series that EA released, and that was back in 2018. Reception to Battlefield 5 failed to meet expectations, and regular content updates for Battlefield 5 ended in 2020. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2018/09/04/this-is-battlefield-5-trailer"] EA announced that it will take an extended time to develop a new Battlefield title, regularly citing a 2021 release window for the next series. During this time, EA has shifted its structure, moving Respawn’s Vince Zampella to lead DICE LA. Check back in the spring when EA is expected to reveal the next Battlefield game officially. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Matt T.M. Kim is a reporter for IGN.

Apex Legends is coming to Nintendo Switch on March 9, developer Respawn announced.

Director Chad Grenier wrote in a blog post that the Switch version of Apex Legends will launch with cross-platform functionality, season 8 content, and “full-feature parity” with other versions.

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Worried you’re already behind during the current season? The good news is that Switch players who purchase the season 8 battle pass will receive 30 battle pass levels for free. Players will also earn double XP during the first two weeks after launch.

Porting Apex Legends to its smallest screen yet is a major achievement, and we couldn’t have done it without our friends at Panic Button,” Grenier said. “We’re very proud of what the team has been able to achieve with some smart optimizations for the Switch port to deliver a full-featured Apex Legends experience on the go.”

[ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2021/02/02/apex-legends-season-8-mayhem-battle-pass-trailer"] Apex Legends season 8 kicked off today, featuring the arrival of its 16th character, demolitions enthusiast Fuse, a new lever-action rifle, and the usual assortment of new cosmetics and battle pass items. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Joseph Knoop is a writer/producer/Crypto main for IGN.

Activision has begun banning Call of Duty Warzone cheaters in what's reportedly one of the biggest waves of bans ever for the game. This time, the company banned more than 60,000 cheaters in the latest drop of its banhammer, according to Vice, which learned of this wave of bans from three sources familiar with Activision. This is the third large wave of bans since the game's launch last year. Over 50,000 players were banned in the first wave last April and an additional 20,000 last September. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/12/15/call-of-duty-black-ops-cold-war-and-warzone-season-one-battle-pass-trailer"] This ban comes just a day after popular Warzone streamer, Vikkstar123, announced that he would no longer play the game, as noted by Vice. He echoed sentiments found throughout the Warzone streaming community at the moment that the game is in the worst state it's ever been in due to hackers and cheaters. Sources close to Vice said this ban wave targeted cheaters using EngineOwning as all EngineOwning account holders using the software to cheat in the game have been "wiped out." On EngineOwning's site, the cheat developers say they are working to update the cheat, according to Vice. Meanwhile, the EngineOwning Discord channel is full of account owners upset that their accounts have been banned by Activision. [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=every-operator-in-call-of-duty-black-ops-cold-war&captions=true"] This ban wave came somewhat out of nowhere considering that Activision previously warned of incoming ban waves before actually dropping the hammer in past instances. Activision laid out at that time what software they consider worthy of a ban and it included "aimbots, wallhacks, trainers, stats hacks, texture hacks, leaderboard hacks, injectors, hex editors or any software used to deliberately modify game data or memory." For more Warzone, check out this trailer of the first season featuring content from Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War and then read about how the battle royale has helped the series earn $3 billion over the last 12 months. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Wesley LeBlanc is a freelance news writer and guide maker for IGN. You can follow him on Twitter @LeBlancWes. 

Amazon has announced that CEO and founder Jeff Bezos will resign from his position during the third quarter of 2021, and will transition to executive chair of Amazon’s board. Amazon Web Services (AWS) CEO Andy Jassy will replace Bezos, according to CNBC.

“I’m excited to announce that this Q3 I’ll transition to Executive Chair of the Amazon Board and Andy Jassy will become CEO,” Bezos wrote in a statement sent to employees. “In the Exec Chair role, I intend to focus my energies and attention on new products and early initiatives. Andy is well known inside the company and has been at Amazon almost as long as I have. He will be an outstanding leader, and he has my full confidence.”

Bezos continued his statement saying that he will use his new role as executive chair of Amazon's board to focus on initiatives like Amazon's Day 1 Fund, the Bezos Earth Fund, Blue Origin, the Washington Post, and others.

Bezos originally founded Amazon in 1994, growing what began as an online bookstore into a massive online retailer that competes in numerous sectors, including food delivery, technology, and movie and television streaming. Amazon passed a $1 trillion market cap in 2020 under Bezos' leadership.

Bezos is worth approximately $182 billion as of last December, according to NPR, making him the wealthiest person on the planet.

Jassy joined Amazon in 1997. He has directed work on Amazon Web Services since its launch in 2006. AWS provides a wide variety of cloud computing and API services to individuals and companies, including data storage, networking, developer tools, and more. To give you an idea of how important AWS had become to Amazon's success, CNBC reports that AWS accounted for 52% of Amazon's operating income in October 2020.

AWS supports various game developers' operations, including Clash of Clans' developer Supercell, Borderlands 3's Gearbox Software, and Monster Hunter World's Capcom.

Amazon's forays into first-party video game development have gone considerably less successful in the past year, with their free-to-play team shooter Crucible shutting down in November last year. An extensive report from Bloomberg in January shed light on Amazon Game Studios' alleged culture of sexual discrimination and mismanagement.

Amazon's game streaming platform, Amazon Luna, is also currently in beta. Amazon's MMO, New World, is expected to launch in Spring 2021.

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After stepping further away from day-to-day operations at Amazon, Bezos found himself pulled back in due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the logistical complications that arose as a result, according to the New York Times.

Bezos has also been criticized numerous times in the past for anti-worker policies, including aggressively monitoring employee behavior to stop unionization efforts, according to CNBC. Amazon also temporarily closed a New Jersey warehouse after a spike in COVID-19 cases among workers in December. In October, Amazon stated that 20,000 employees had caught COVID-19 during the first six months of the pandemic.

[poilib element="accentDivider"] Joseph Knoop is a writer/producer for IGN.

PS5 exclusive and February PlayStation Plus game Destruction AllStars is a car combat game filled with several modes designed to let you cause as much destruction as possible. It’s also designed to let players get out of their cars, and run around on foot as one of a number of different hero characters. Keeping both types of gameplay fun, connected, and meaningful was a key component of Lucid Games’ development on AllStars, and it’s something that’s been core to the new game since its earliest days. “The characters were in from month one of development,” Game Director Colin Berry told IGN in an interview ahead of AllStars’ launch. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/destruction-allstars-s-ranked-mayhem-gameplay"] And to create those heroes, who were most recently highlighted in AllStars’ State of Play presentation, Lucid and Sony XDEV actually wanted to make these characters from around the world respectful and authentic to where they were based. “We contacted a bunch of artists from around the world who don't work in video games, [people who work in] comic book, graphic novels, and so on. And we gave them a really simple brief of the game and what we thought these characters would be like in terms of personality,” Sony XDEV Senior Producer John MacLaughlin told IGN. “We contacted so many different people from around the world; South America, Africa, Japan, the Middle East, Russia, Eastern Europe, and we got this wild, eclectic bunch of art through with these characters.” [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=destruction-allstars-game-modes-reveal&captions=true"] And those concepts found their way into the game thanks to the many diverse artists - key aspects of character designs like Genesis, who has blades instead of legs, came from the imagination of the artists rather than as mandates from the development team. And while players will spend plenty of time behind the wheel as these characters, one of AllStars’ unique hooks is letting players jump out of their cars and run around on foot. Able to pull off unique hero moves, some impressive parkour, and more, playing as these characters is integral to the experience, and pretty much always was throughout development. Though it definitely took some tuning to get the on-foot gameplay right. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/destruction-allstars-ps5-gameplay-in-4k-60fps"] “For quite a while in the project, we had a really good sense of what the play is like in a vehicle. We want the vehicles to be super agile, even the heavy ones are more agile than you'd see in a racing game,” Berry explained. “Now we've got characters [and] we can't just have them vulnerable because then it's going to be no fun. But we can't have them too powerful. We're not going to give them rocket launches because that's a completely different game. So we need them to be these hyper-real athletic characters.” And as the team discovered how to weave the character and vehicle gameplay together so they went hand-in-hand, it helped the team also understand how to build arenas that would suit both types of gameplay without ever letting one get too far away from the other in the multiplayer-focused experience. [poilib element="quoteBox" parameters="excerpt=%E2%80%9CWe%20didn't%20want%20to%20separate%20the%20characters%20from%20the%20vehicle%20too%20much.%22"]“We didn't want to separate the characters from the vehicle too much. We didn't want skyscrapers, even though that could be cool to climb to the top of and dive into the arena, because while you're climbing a skyscraper, climbing's quite solitary,” Berry explained. “If you've got 16 characters and four of them are out of the vehicles and they're climbing up a skyscraper, they're not really involved in a multiplayer game at that stage.” Berry explained how, while the early test versions of levels could be quite large and quite tall, Lucid did work to scale the arenas into more focused combat zones to keep players, both in and out of vehicles, as connected to the combat at all times as possible. Players can see this for themselves now, as Destruction AllStars is available on PS5 and is included in this month's PS Plus lineup. For more on the new PS5 exclusive, learn about why Destruction AllStars' delay helped set it up for a PS Plus launch, and stay tuned to IGN for more on the new game. [poilib element="poll" parameters="id=6dd2b926-8863-4080-99b2-d08eb61f67f6"] [poilib element="accentDivider"] Jonathon Dornbush is IGN's Senior News Editor, host of Podcast Beyond!, and PlayStation lead. Talk to him on Twitter @jmdornbush.

In the Heights and Crazy Rich Asians director Jon M. Chu is set to direct the film adaptation of Wicked, according to the Hollywood Reporter.

Chu is replacing Stephen Daldry (director on The Crown, Billy Elliot), who exited the project back in October after scheduling changes conflicted with Daldry’s commitments.

Chu departed from his role as director on Disney Plus’ Willow sequel series in early January.

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The Wicked film, based on the hugely popular Broadway musical that itself is a retelling of the Wizard of Oz from the point-of-view of the witches, was originally set to release on Dec 22, 2021. Universal has since delayed the movie to an indeterminate date due to ongoing COVID-19 closures for theaters and production sets.

[poilib element="accentDivider"] Joseph Knoop is a writer/producer/man behind the curtain for IGN.

CD Projekt Red said Cyberpunk 2077 players should use caution when downloading mods and custom saves for the game after community members discovered a save file exploit that could harm your PC. Reportedly there is a bug that allows hackers to hide malicious executables within certain mods. Eurogamer talked with CDPR, and the developer said the issue is linked to the external DLL files the game uses. DLL stands for Dynamic-link library, which is a library containing data that multiple programs can access and use at the same time. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/12/10/cyberpunk-2077-pc-review"] Cyberpunk 2077 community member PixelRick discovered the issue, and explained that the issue makes non-executable files executable, which could carry out "any locally executed virus." "You should be able to trust data file mods to be harmless, and only be skeptical about executables in general," PixelRick said to Eurogamer. "This vulnerability makes it impossible to really trust any modded data file for this game until [the] patch." [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=cyberpunk-2077-examples-of-visual-bugs&captions=true"] CDPR thanked the community for flagging the issue and said they are working on a fix, saying, "We advise everyone to refrain from using files obtained from unknown sources. Anyone who plans to use mods or custom saves for Cyberpunk 2077 should use caution until we release the aforementioned fix." A temporary fix was already made for Cyber Engine Tweaks, a popular modding tool for the game. Cyberpunk 2077 has been no stranger to bugs and issues since its launch late last year. The backlash regarding the game's performance on last-gen consoles caused CDPR to offer refunds for the game, which led to Sony delisting the digital version from PlayStation Network. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/12/15/cyberpunk-2077-for-xbox-one-and-playstation-4-review"] Last month, CD Projekt Red co-founder Marcin Iwiński apologized on behalf of the company and announced that Cyberpunk 2077's free next-gen upgrade is set to launch in the second half of 2021. Despite all this, Cyberpunk 2077 reportedly had the biggest digital game launch of all time. For more, check out our Review Crew discussion on Cyberpunk 2077: One Month Later. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Logan Plant is a news writer for IGN, and the Production Assistant for Nintendo Voice Chat, IGN's weekly Nintendo show. You can find him on Twitter at @LoganJPlant.

Scott Snyder has been at the helm of some of the biggest DC Comics stories of the last decade, but in 2021 he's focusing his attention on his new creator-owned imprint, Best Jackett Press. As we previously announced, the first project to launch under that imprint will be Snyder and Tony Daniel's Nocterra, a post-apocalyptic horror series set in a world of constant darkness. Now IGN can debut new cover art for Nocterra #1. Check out the slideshow gallery below for a closer look at the first issue of Nocterra, including these new covers and several previously released interior pages: [widget path="global/article/imagegallery" parameters="albumSlug=nocterra-1-preview-a-new-post-apocalyptic-horror-saga-begins&captions=true"] The series is set in a world where the sun's light mysteriously vanished ten years ago. This never-ending shroud of darkness transforms humans into terrifying shades and forces survivors to hide from the monsters all around the world. The only way to travel safely is by enlisting the aid of "ferrymen" who travel in illuminated transport vehicles. The series' main protagonist, Valentina "Val" Riggs, is one such ferryman, and she takes on a new job with the promise of a true sanctuary awaiting on the other side of the Rocky Mountains. "The inspiration for this one was both simple and personal," Snyder told IGN. "As a kid, I had an intense fear of the dark.  About a year ago one of my sons developed a pretty intense fear of the dark himself, and  lying in bed with him one night, the idea just sort of hit me: what if tomorrow morning sunlight just stopped reaching the earth? And what if this new darkness we found ourselves in was far scarier than anything we imagined as kids? A darkness that changes every living creature into a monster called a shade. The only way to avoid being turned into a shade is to stay lit by whatever illumination you can find." “I’m so inspired by this story and the ideas its giving me for the various characters as well as the monsters," said Daniel. "I usually am not so excited to draw background characters, they’re usually just filler to the main image,  but I love drawing the various background characters in this series.  I look for any excuse to squeeze more and more in! Each one has their own style and story behind them in my mind and that makes it so enjoyable.” While originally launched as a Kickstarter release, Nocterra will also be published monthly through Image Comics. The first issue is due to hit stores on Wednesday, March 3. [ignvideo url="https://www.ign.com/videos/2020/12/22/comixologys-snow-angels-exclusive-official-trailer"] Snyder has already teased his second Best Jackett Press series with artist Ariela Kristantina, a blood-soaked and mysterious comic called Chain. Meanwhile, Snyder's frequent collaborator Jock is also pivoting to creator-owned horror comics in 2021, as he and writer Jeff Lemire join forces on the comiXology Unlimited-exclusive series Snow Angels. All three projects were among the picks in our 21 Most Anticipated Comics of 2021 list. [poilib element="accentDivider"] Jesse is a mild-mannered staff writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on Twitter.