I always liked gaming forums, so it's a pity.

Social media sites are ok just for temporary communications.
Reddit is a bit more organized, but it has some annoyances (weird paragraphs, no attachments, threads archival, etc)

I hope that Gog's one won't die too : (

Btw, what will happen to the possible useful info & files stored on Bioware forums?

Most likely gone for good unless some users do bioware's work in preserving them i guess.
So ya gonna be quite sad regarding that i assume (haven't used the bioware forums in a while though to be honest so can't really tell how much "quality content" is gonna be lost)

Actually, I thought Mass Effect 3 was excellent until they fucked everything up thoroughly with the ending. BioWare managed to spell apocalypse quite convincingly, and I first cleared ME3 in a 3 day binge with a thorough reality hangover following, it was that good.

Of course, Origin fucked ME3 up even more thoroughly than the silly deus ex ending(s) did.

Sad news due to what it means, as any such piece is. And for the switch to social media, handing over your communication with your audience to other networks and companies and letting them ultimately control what happens.

I certainly hope it isn't. I would have to find somewhere else to stay, not looking forward to be homeless in the virtual world of the web (no, thank you, Facebook and the like do not appeal to me).
As far as I've understood, they just stopped using them in games released after a certain date, but they're still available for purchase and use for earlier games.

The BioWare forums have been full of trolls and negativity for a long time. To top it off, the mods would delete posts and ban users for speaking negatively about their games, so I can't say I'm sad to see it go.

Truth.

From the perspective of a former moderator in a major game publisher's forum: Usually when mods delete actual and continuous abuse, forum users still think posts were deleted just because "something negative" was said about games. Which is very, very seldom the truth.

When clear cut personal insults in a forum are prevalent and the developers are routinely accused of illegal conduct, that's the shit that ought to get deleted and the users that need to get banned. If you can't do that or are scared of it because it might damage your reputation, you're better off without an official company forum.

That's why they're shutting down, I guess.

A doppelganger ? Name sure fits.

I liked Dragon Age 2 (not as much as its predecessor, but still) and Mass Effect 2 and 3 (both more than Mass Effect 1).

I hope this doesn't become a trend.

I don't have membership on any developer's forum but I find that if I get stuck in a game or need a hint or just an idea of what a quest / choice or whatever offers chances are someone on the actual developer forum already has discussed it at length.

And I'm sure a lot of you know I'm not big on link clicking ;) So I feel most secure searching my query and then clicking on an ACTUAL game developer site, rather than *PHat1337HinTzzz.com*

Sure, sure youtube is pretty good for a pure walkthrough. But sometimes I want to see a bit of a discussion of "If I do this... then what?" Do I spoil and "cheat" like this often? No, not really. But sometimes I just want to know what unintended / intended consequences an in game choice might have. I did this a few times when I played Pillars of Eternity.

I'd hate to think more and more developers will shut down their forum, because I feel like it's the "safest" place for me to find discussion on this kind of thing.

Ironically, though I don't Steam, I'll again sometimes check out their forum when it pops up for one of my ingame questions. It looks like I can only see a limited number of pages of discussion, but usually it's enough LOL.

Wow thats sad their games and history is classic truly ,,

game makers should stay from sociel media sites like twitter and facebook due to their tracking habits for more cash, if you read the tos agreement companys like facebook and twitter beleave they have right to gather all info on us , in the news you see where they now can have access to even our cell phone activity ect,,,

Facebook is the worst invasion of privacy just by seeing a site on their server gives them acces to gather alli nfo on us as they call it their users,, been in news for years ect..

i will never use facebook or twiter or steam due to also their drm always on games crap over that issue.

P.S i hope Gog will never go that way like bioware, this is the only place i ever trusted to buy games and use their forums since all that mess started,,,,, and well i miss days when games was on disc and updates was full zips we could burn to a disc,,

i stoped buying games in 2007 and only started when i found this great company who makes witcher series my favorite game...

Todays my birth day and as i download me a gift i had to answer this post and hope i wasnt too text raged over another company using lame sociel medial spyware will miss bioware forums too .. :(

(eats a slice of birthday cake and waits on game download)

to all the other Gogers out here on their bdays eat up and Happy Bday to you too :)

Not necassarily shut them down, but at least put them on sale from time to time.

75%, no less :)

Hmm, sad. I wonder if this will include the BSN entitlements page?