When news broke last week that BioWare GM Casey Hudson and Dragon Age executive producer Mark Darrah were suddenly “retiring” from the company, many took to Twitter to wish them well.
Then there’s this guy…
Greg Ellis, a voice actor for the Dragon Age franchise who brought both Cullen and Anders to life, launched into a truly bizarre public Twitter rant at Darrah that left the entire gaming community scratching its head in confusion.
The response has been overwhelmingly not in Ellis’s favor, seemingly souring the fanbase on him and jeopardizing his continued opportunity with the fantasy franchise.
When Darrah sent out a tweet talking about his retirement, Ellis struck, commenting back that this was, “a relief for many others.”
“I’ve worked with you for over 10 years as the voice of Cullen (and Anders) @DragonAge and have never worked with a more disloyal, duplicitous corporate fake. Your enforced ‘resignation’ is a victory for @BioWare, its employees, and particularly the fans.”
While some may have ignored the obvious trolling, Darrah responded with a resounding message of condemnation on December 4, which is a fan appreciation day for the franchise called Dragon Age Day.
“Hey there Greg,” Darrah said. “I’ve been letting you slide for a while but I think Dragon Age Day is maybe the day when that ends. Is there some world where you imagine that your behavior with regards to me and the community in general would actual (sic) cause you to EVER be hired on a Dragon Age game? I’m not sure if this is performative in some way in order to get the attention of a different group, but it CERTAINLY isn’t going to endear you to a company that cares about its public appearance.”
Before all this happened, the writing appeared to be on the wall when it came to Ellis and his continued employment through BioWare projects. He was accused of being transphobic and racist, which Darrah directly responded to.
“Like you, it’s important to us that the people we work with are aligned with our BioWare values,” Darrah said back on August 31. “This will be apparent when we’re ready to announce which actors will be lending their voices to the game.”
Ellis went on to say that Darrah was forced to resign from BioWare, noting that he pandered to “a few small minded bigots.” While it is possible that this resignation was forced, there is absolutely no concrete proof of this.
BioWare has long been known as a community minded company that avoids public drama at all costs. If Ellis hadn’t already disqualified himself from coming back for Dragon Age 4, it’s possible that his tenure might be up.
