Star Wars Battlefront II Will Have More Content At Launch, Future Games Get Release Windows.
Another EA conference call helps us shed light on upcoming Star Wars games, as we now have an idea about how big Battlefront II is going to be at launch. In addition, we’ve also learned about the release windows for future Star Wars titles.
At an investor’s event, EA CEO Andrew Wilson stated that Battlefront II will “have more than three times the content than the previous game at launch”. The key phrase being “the previous game at launch” – when Battlefront I first hit the shelves, the game had 13 playable maps, 12 game modes across single player and multiplayer, 10 vehicles, 11 weapons, and 6 heroes. All of those numbers grew substantially over the course of the game’s lifespan with free and paid DLC, so that’s not too hard a hurdle to overcome. It’s still worth noting that we shouldn’t expect over 39 maps, 36 game modes, 30 vehicles, 33 weapons, and 18 heroes at launch, either – with new features like a campaign mode being added and two additional eras, there will be more to the sequel’s total content than just raw numbers that literally triple existing statistics.
On the subject of how Battlefront II will approach its inevitable maelstrom of DLC, Wilson reiterated that the game will not utilize a Season Pass format in favor of a live service plan that DICE is keeping a lid on until EA Play and E3 (both of which will be held in June). Sales for the title are expected to match or exceed what the first game made in its first year (14 million copies sold) with room for growth expected. Beyond Battlefront lie two other EA Star Wars projects developed by Visceral Games and Respawn Entertainment. The former is apparently looking at a release window anywhere between April 2018 and March 2019, while the latter will be some time after that. Presuming that EA is aiming for annual releases from this point on, Battlefront III will likely come in late 2019 – perhaps in time for Episode IX to arrive on Blu-Ray – but that title has not been announced as of yet.
In any case, we’ll have more news on the future of Star Wars gaming come June, so stay on target with SWNN for more Star Wars news.
Grant has been a fan of Star Wars for as long as he can remember, having seen every movie on the big screen. When he’s not hard at work with his college studies, he keeps himself busy by reporting on all kinds of Star Wars news for SWNN and general movie news on the sister site, Movie News Net. He served as a frequent commentator on SWNN’s The Resistance Broadcast.
Is it just me, or does EA underestimate, almost to a comical degree, the number of Star Wars vid games that the market would support at any given time?
Battlefront… wait a year… Lego TFA… wait a year… Battlefront Yet Again… wait another year… Visceral SW game… another year ticks away… Respawn SW game… all of us are yet another year not-younger… Battlefront Ad Nauseum…
Seems to me that they have room to speed up this snail’s-pace release schedule just a wee bit.
Well, wait until their rights for the games expire.
And who will step in to fill the gap? You people talk like there are hundreds of AAA game studios out there who would be willing and interested in taking on Star Wars.
Maybe they’ll be freelance like with Marvel.
Games today are not exactly easy to make. Depending on the size of the team making one, it could take years.
It’s always taken years to make AAA Star Wars games. From X-wing, to DF, to JK, to Force Commander. They all took years to complete. I’ve seen that same thought expressed on many threads, and it’s just not accurate.
No, they didn’t. I’ve been in the game industry for 24 years, just because we didn’t get Star Wars games that frequently doesn’t mean they were in production for years. 18 months would be considered extravagant during the time those games you mention were created.
Case in point: Lucasarts got the Star Wars rights back from Broderbund in 1992. Lawrence Holland didn’t start working on X-wing until after that point and it was released in February 1993.
Besides, the game industry is much, much different now, with exponentially larger investment and risk. Time is just one axis of the equation. There’s also money and staff. X-wing had less than 15 people on it total. The last Battlefront game had 13 Directors and 23 Leads to keep the massive feature teams on track.
Let’s not forget how long it takes to make these games. EA rushed Battlefront to the market and as a result it was a veritable skeleton of a game at launch. In addition, I’m sure EA and Lucasfilm are working closely together as to what stories to tell and making sure that the games that are released match up with their plans. The example would be if Respawn were working on something Old Republic timeline: obviously you don’t want to go ahead and release that in 2018 because Lucasfilm isn’t working on Old Republic timelines yet. The release schedule for the EA games is going match up with what Lucasfilm is doing in terms of the era of story-telling and the subject matter involved with it.
In addition, it does over saturate the market when you have multiple titles of the same franchise that exist within a small time-frame. If we followed your logic then there would be a new Elder Scrolls or Battlefield or Call of Duty every six months. Having games spaced out over the course of a few years gives opportunity for the gaming community to play one game, gobble up any DLC that is released for it (which obviously pads EA’s financials), feel like they got their moneys worth, and then move on to the next newest released game.
Star Wars isn’t exactly like the other franchises you mentioned. Elder Scrolls is always an open world RPG. Battlefield and COD are always shooters. Take Battlefront, Knights of the Old Republic, and Racer Revenge for example; they’re all completely different games. The only thing they share is a name and a universe. Releasing two games that are different enough for a single franchise in a year isn’t unheard of either. Need for Speed did it in 2011 when they released one arcade and one simulator. Also, there are different studios working on the games, so releasing more doesn’t necessarily mean it has to be rushed. If EA wants more Star Wars, put another studio on it. All that matters is they give the studios the time they need, and don’t force them to release it the month before the newest movie.
You still need studios with available resources to make those games. And with current gen game teams routinely exceeding 200 people, that’s not nearly as easy as you seem to think it is. How many studios do you think EA could trust with a Star Wars game anyway?
You think Dice, Visceral, Respawn, and Bioware are the only ones they can trust? I’m sure there are a couple others they’d consider worthy, and that’s all it would take to have three or four games come out every two years. I’m sure they’d be willing to reassign another studio to a Star Wars game if they felt it would be more profitable than another IP.
Well, there’s just so many dollars one can spend in games, and there are other games besides SW, so maybe they want to give costumers a chance to recharge their wallets? Also, we still need to see if this VR thing is going to grow or not (I predict not, like 3D tv’s)
Agreed, maybe one every 8 months or so. Although, maybe it’s just that we haven’t gotten an original, story-driven console game since 2010. Once Battlefront II hits, one per year might turn out to be alright (as long as it’s not Battlefront every other year).
The problem isn’t EA, it’s that Lucasfilm only licensed to EA and random mobile developers.
And Travellers Tales (LEGO games) and Disney (The Infinity Star Wars playsets, RIP)
EA has exclusive publishing license, and they can only work on so many Star Wars games at a time. Not to mention the amount of time it takes to make a game these days.
If they were able to release more Star Wars games that people would buy, they absolutely would.
Would you rather have more games, or good ones? I prefer the latter, even though I am also anxiously awaiting the Visceral game. The fact that it isn’t out yet nor has any significant news updates troubles me. EA does internal mock reviews of games in production, and they’re usually pretty spot on. They were willing to release Mass Effect Andromeda and undoubtedly knew how the fan base would react. The Visceral game must be a real mess if two Battlefront games will be out before it is.
Regardless, current generation games take huge amounts of time and resources to create. EA has a finite number of studios that can be trusted with the license, and all of them are working on Star Wars games (rumors are that the Daryl project that Bioware will likely announce at E3 is also a Star Wars game). So who is going to make all these other Star Wars games just waiting to be created?
As an aside, EA doesn’t do the Lego games, Travellers Tales does. 🙂
I understand that games take a lot of time to make. My observation wasn’t about project lifecycles. It was about the incredibly sparse array of SW games currently scheduled for release over the next several years.
I understand, they don’t want to use just any studio. But given that EA got the exclusive rights to the Star Wars franchise in 2013, and the release schedule mentioned in the article takes us out to about 2020, that’s four, maybe five games in seven years from three different studios.
Also consider that the Battlefront games aren’t exactly going to be treading new ground from one another – Battlefront 2 will essentially be an upgrade of the 2015 Battlefront. Not that there isn’t some good work to be done on each, but it will still be building on what was done before.
So, that’s three different games in 7 years, along with one, maybe two upgrades/sequels to one of those three.
As of now, we’ve gotten exactly ONE game in the four years since EA acquired those exclusive rights. (And it was friggin’ Battlefront at that.) Bearing in mind the time that it takes to make games these days, I’m still profoundly unimpressed.
Curious to see about this “live service plan” concept. I assume it still means pay for content in some form and not just $60 and you’re done. But overall, if there’s a good campaign/single-player mode, and a schedule of periodic updates with new multi-player content, (and prequel content!!!!), this keeps everybody happy.
“live service plan” refers to all pre- and post-launch events/updates/DLC, and other community stuff.
It doesn’t specifically mean paid content, but includes it.
Please Battlefront, no more sonic imploders. Most useless weapon in the galaxy.
Huh? A well-placed imploder can kill lots of dudes at once.
Eh! There’s a very good reason why the corresponding Hutt contact only requires 5 kills, because it’s as much use as a chocolate teapot.
I misread your comment. Sonic imploders do suck. I thought you were talking about thermal imploders for a second.
Great for blinding an enemy solider for about 2 seconds, if that’s what you’re into.
im getting old waiting for visceral sw game, i hope they launch it in 2018
“anywhere between April 2018 and March 2019”
So…Han Solo tie in it is then 🙂
The guy who we’ve been talking to – the one who suggested that it’s a tie-in in the first place – has suggested otherwise, though it was a Han Solo game at one point. Plenty of smuggling in it, though!
– Pomojema
Three times content and three eras. That math adds up