Star Wars: Battlefront 3 is why EA shut down Mass Effect and BioWare says report

Guess EA saw no point in having two sci-fi properties (EA) A new Star Wars: Battlefront game hasn’t even been formally announced yet, but it’s being cited as the main reason behind BioWare’s closure. Despite describing BioWare as a ‘legendary studio that helped define the role-playing genre,’ EA still opted to shut down the developer and cancel its next Mass Effect game, claiming that it needs to focus on fewer large scale projects. It’s easy to assume that it was also a cost cutting measure, to offset the massive debt EA faces following its leveraged buyout, as well as the fact that BioWare’s last game, Dragon Age: The Veilguard, was considered a sales flop. However, fans have been given a new target for their ire, which is alleged to be the most significant factor in BioWare’s death: Star Wars. Supposedly it was EA’s decision to prioritise development of Star Wars: Battlefront 3 which was the final nail in BioWare’s coffin, with the new online sequel having been hotly rumoured for the last week or so. This is according to anonymous sources familiar with EA’s plans, who told Bloomberg that company executives projected that both Battlefront 3 and the new Mass Effect would cost hundreds of millions of dollars to make. Want GTA 6 news? Sign up to the GameCentral newsletter for the latest GTA 6 news, reviews of new games you should play and exclusive analysis of the biggest stories of the week. Ultimately, they figured it wasn’t worth it for two sci-fi themed games, even if they are in different genres, and opted to invest in the larger franchise, seeing it as a safer bet – even though Star Wars is currently at a low ebb in terms of popularity. A new Star Wars game would be a far more expensive investment, though, since EA needs to foot the bill for licensing the property. In fact, this was assumed to be why the company announced plans to move away from licensed games a couple of years ago. Granted, EA does have a history of flip-flopping, over both licensed games and single-player titles. Last generation, it infamously declared that single-player games are dead, only to change its tune after finding success with Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order. It’s also possible Lucasfilm has been a bit more generous with the cost of licensing fees lately, as part of a bid to expand Star Wars’ reach – since it hasn’t had a hot movie in years and yet its video games are on a hot streak at the moment. The successes of Zero Company and Galactic Racer seem to have vindicated Lucasfilm’s more flexible approach to choosing partners and they’ve already implied there’ll be more experimental Star Wars games in the future. It also seems likely that EA and Lucasfilm plan to have Battlefront 3 coincide with the next mainline Star Wars movie – Episode X – and thus ride the hype of what is billed as the start of a new trilogy, which is widely expected to be announced next year for Star Wars’ 50th anniversary. It would make sense for EA and Lucasfilm to take advantage of such a cross promotion as Star Wars: Battlefront 2 came out in 2017 – the same year as The Last Jedi – and featured a single-player campaign that acted as something of a prequel to the sequel trilogy, detailing how the Empire finally lost the Galactic Civil War on the planet Jakku, home planet of sequel trilogy heroine Rey. As such, it can be speculated that Battlefront 3’s premise will cover events set between the sequel trilogy and this new one. At the moment there’s no clue when the new trilogy will be set or what it’ll be about but it’s being written by Dark Phoenix scripter Simon Kinberg and directed by Spider-Man: No Way Home director Jon Watts… which isn’t very enouraging. Battlefront 2 featured the original and prequel eras too (EA) Email gamecentral@metro.co.uk, leave a comment below, follow us on Twitter. To submit Inbox letters and Reader’s Features more easily, without the need to send an email, just use our Submit Stuff page here. For more stories like this, check our Gaming page. Arrow MORE: Roblox sees decline in players as company brags it can import ‘any game’ with AI Arrow MORE: PS5 console sales after six years are stronger than PS4 and PS3 Arrow MORE: No more Assassin’s Creed remakes says Ubisoft as Hexe gets new update GameCentral Get the latest GTA 6 news, reviews of new games you should play and exclusive analysis of the biggest stories of the week.