Star Wars: Fate of the Old Republic is backed by a former NetEase exec who wants creator led games

Star Wars: Fate of the Old Republic was one of the biggest reveals at The Game Awards 2025, and now we know more about the money behind it.

The single player RPG is being developed by Arcanaut Studios, the new team led by former BioWare veteran Casey Hudson. Hudson is best known for his work on Mass Effect, which makes his return to a big narrative sci fi RPG especially notable.

According to a new Bloomberg report, the project is being funded by GreaterThan Group, or GTG. The company was founded by former NetEase executive Simon Zhu, who previously worked with many of NetEase’s Western partners before the company pulled back funding from several of them.

Zhu appears to be betting that the industry has overcorrected. Instead of chasing heavy cost cutting, generative AI, or safer corporate formulas, GTG is backing experienced creators and giving them room to build the projects they want.

His argument is simple: commercial success, player satisfaction, and artistic ambition do not have to work against each other.

That philosophy fits Star Wars: Fate of the Old Republic. The game is being pitched as a single player RPG from former BioWare developers, which immediately brings expectations around story, characters, choices, and worldbuilding.

Hudson also made one thing clear: Arcanaut Studios will not use generative AI tools. He said he finds AI creatively soulless and is not impressed by its value in the creative process. That stands out at a time when many studios are openly adding AI into art, production, or development pipelines.

Here is the current picture:

Hudson also suggested the game will not be built as a massive 200 hour RPG. He said bigger is not always better, noting that many players want to start a game and actually finish it. That could mean Fate of the Old Republic aims for a tighter, more focused RPG structure rather than an endless open world.

That may be the right move. Modern RPGs often compete on size, but not every story benefits from being stretched across hundreds of hours. A shorter, denser Star Wars RPG with strong writing and meaningful choices could be more appealing than another oversized game filled with filler.

GTG is not only funding Hudson’s studio. Bullet Farm, founded by former Call of Duty: Black Ops lead David Vonderhaar, is also part of its portfolio. MAGship, led by Masato Sakai, is another company backed by GTG.

That gives Zhu’s new group a clear identity. It is backing known creative leaders rather than trying to build everything around one internal corporate machine.

Of course, the approach still has to work. Star Wars: Fate of the Old Republic is years away, and licensed Star Wars games always carry huge expectations. The Old Republic name also brings a lot of history, especially for fans of BioWare’s classic Knights of the Old Republic games and MMO era storytelling.

But the early signs are interesting. A former BioWare lead is making a single player Star Wars RPG, the project has funding from a group that says it does not want to compromise art for success, and the studio is avoiding generative AI.

That does not guarantee a great game. But it does make Fate of the Old Republic feel like a rare project in the current industry: a big licensed RPG built around a creator led vision instead of a live service trend.