Electronic Arts have shaken up how it will be approaching the Battlefield franchise in the future, with the intent now to create a “connected Battlefield universe.” The publisher announced that it would be making some major changes to its development structure on Thursday, with the biggest being the creation of a Battlefield universe that will act as a bridge across a variety of games and other modes, with different development studios partnering together along way.
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Alongside the shake-up, DICE GM Oskar Gabrielson is leaving the company to pursue a new endeavor outside of Electronic Arts. In his place, Respawn Entertainment’s Vince Zampella will take on a bigger role as the boss of the Battlefield franchise in addition to overseeing Apex Legends and whatever else Respawn is creating. Marcus Lehto, with the studio he announced in October, will focus on incorporating more storytelling into the world of Battlefield after helping with Battlefield 2042 in the “immediate future.” Finally, Ripple Effect, the developer of Battlefield 2042‘s Portal Mode, will begin developing “a new Battlefield experience” within the current game.
Speaking to GameSpot, Zampella said that the new strategy is more about making “interconnected” worlds for players and give players more to experience and that EA plans to have its Battlefield teams “grow significantly,” which may include a free-to-play game.
“This is an ‘And’ strategy in many ways,” Zampella said. “We will continue to evolve and grow Battlefield 2042, and we’ll explore new kinds of experiences and business models along the way that we can add to that foundation to provide an awesome array of experiences for our players. In this universe, the world is interconnected with shared characters and narrative. This universe is also built with our community as we harness the power of Portal and user generated content that puts creativity in the hands of our players.”
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The move seems to be similar to what Activision has been doing with the Call of Duty franchise as of late, with all of its Call of Duty developers working together to create shared experiences while still releasing yearly games. The recently released Call of Duty: Vanguard was a standalone game, but its weapons — as well as the weapons from the previously released Call of Duty: Modern Warfare — are available in the Call of Duty Warzone battle royale mode.
It’s currently unclear what the future of the Battlefield franchise looks like, but it does seem like EA is committed to trying anything to fix the series. After its launch in November, Battlefield 2042 players were very critical of the game, noting that it launched without many core Battlefield features and an acceptable level of polish. DICE has slowly been putting out updates to address some of these criticisms. However, EA COO Laura Miele said 2042 is “trending in the right direction.”
This suite of Battlefield news also further puts a damper on any hopes for Star Wars Battlefront 3 as a recent insider report stated that EA rejected said pitch due to licensing costs. With EA’s new push toward Battlefield, it’s easy to see how an outside license might not be in its interest, especially after the reception to its last two Battlefront games.
