Home Gaming Battlefront skipped its single player to capitalise on Force Awakens fervour

Battlefront skipped its single player to capitalise on Force Awakens fervour

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Star Wars Battlefront is a pretty good game, but its lack of a proper single player element made it feel a little hollow in the end. The same could be said for other EA-published shooters, like Titanfall, Plants Vs Zombies: Garden Warfare and other publisher’s games, like the exceptional Rainbow Six Siege. People love their games to feel complete – and a single player campaign is important in shooters that make their way to retail.

It’s something Activision learned with its last gen, multiplayer-only release of Black Ops 3 – and it’s something that EA has now, finally, realised about its own shooters as well.

In its Investor Day Q&A session (via Dualshockers), professional guesser Wedbush Securities Analyst Michael Pachter pulled no punches in asking EA about the quality of its games, saying that the publisher has “blown it” with the NBA brand (which fares poorly in all aspect when compared to 2K’s NBA), has “probably killed Medal of Honor,” and utterly failed to make a “super-high rated Star Wars game.”

EA Studios Executive Vice President Patrick Söderlund addressed the questions- saying that Star Wars Battlefront is doing well enough, and that the reason they skipped a single player campaign was to have the game out in time to capitalise on the Force Awakens.

“So, I would agree with you on NBA, that is something that we struggled with as an organization and so we have a different plan in play right now, but we hope to rectify that. Overall, if you look at our overall portfolio, I would say that we’re in good shape.

We are as good or better as the other people in the industry on average. […] Star Wars, I think is a game where you have to look at it from a slightly different perspective. Yes, we know that the one thing that we got criticized for was the lack of a single player campaign in it. It was a conscious decision that we made due to time, and being able to launch the game side by side with the movie that came out to get the strongest possible impact.

I think the team created a really good game based on the premise that we had, and I would say that the game was done very well for us, and reached a very different demographic that a traditional EA game would do. So from that perspective it’s a success.

Are we happy with the 75 ratings? No. Is that something that we’re going to cure going forward? Absolutely. But I think overall, we look at everything that we do in isolation, but if you take a step back and look at our overall portfolio, it’s actually in pretty good shape.”

In the same Q&A, Söderlund said that single player campaigns are important for mainstream success.

“In regards to the depth and breadth question, it goes back to the framework I described, where depth and breadth is one of the points that we looked at. And what we learned over the years, is that certain games and certain genres have different requirements for depth and breadth if you want to reach the maximum audience.

The shooter category as an example, we know to be true that in order for a game to truly break out and become really large, you most likely need both a single player campaign where the player can get familiar with the game and practice playing the game, to then hop on and play online.

Other games are more single player focused and may completely lack an online component, and that’s rare in our case. […] Overall we believe, and this is something that we’re working on on a daily basis, to make sure that the games that we take into market have the right depth and breadth.”

The next Battlefront Game, should EA make one that is, will likely feature a single player campaign. I know that I, personally, don’t buy multiplayer-only games because I tend to not play online adversarial content for very long, but I may be an outlier in that regard. How important is single player to you?

Last Updated: May 18, 2016

28 Comments

  1. Viking Of Science

    May 18, 2016 at 12:18

    Well, Shit…

    Whatever, IRON MAIDEN TONIGHT!

    Reply

    • Alien Emperor Trevor

      May 18, 2016 at 12:20

      Sounds like torture. :/

      Reply

      • Darren Peach

        May 18, 2016 at 13:15

        Iron Maiden, Always freaked me out with their posters as a kid.

        Reply

  2. Admiral Chief Protector

    May 18, 2016 at 12:18

    In short:
    More money, less effort

    Reply

    • Pariah

      May 18, 2016 at 12:18

      “We saw an opportunity to do less and make more, so we jumped on it.”

      Reply

  3. Alien Emperor Trevor

    May 18, 2016 at 12:19

    Heh. Doesn’t explain why so few game modes, maps, or anything else MP-related didn’t make it into your glorified cash-in movie tie-in game.

    Reply

  4. oVg whippersnapper

    May 18, 2016 at 12:43

    “being able to launch the game side by side with the movie that came out to get the strongest possible impact.”

    But… this game has nothing to do with the movie.

    Reply

    • Ghost In The Rift

      May 18, 2016 at 12:47

      They went with cool by association i guess

      Reply

  5. Ghost In The Rift

    May 18, 2016 at 12:50

    Single player is why i am a gamer, if that dies out my PC will be stored in a box and be forgotten, i really miss a good single player Star Wars game, nothing has filled that empty void KOTOR left behind, yet.

    Reply

    • Matthew Holliday

      May 18, 2016 at 12:54

      i feel the same about mass effect.

      Reply

      • Darren Peach

        May 18, 2016 at 13:04

        But Mass Effect is coming to a store near you at some point in the future.

        Reply

      • Ghost In The Rift

        May 18, 2016 at 13:46

        At least we know Andromeda is releasing next year,that’s the only game that will keep me away from The Witcher 3(for a month), don’t think we have hope for KOTOR 3, the MMO made sure of that.

        Reply

    • Darren Peach

      May 18, 2016 at 13:10

      I would say, being a OG gamer ( see how I did that, Made being old seem cool ? ). This would be a factor for us. But there are a whole new generation of squeakers that grew up with Digital and PVR that have noooo patience whatsoever. Abstract concepts like rewinding the video tape and playing outside are totally lost on em. They have such short attention spans that I doubt they could handle a loooong single player distraction. I bet this is who EA are targeting as their primary market. That, or I am talking shite.

      Reply

      • Ghost In The Rift

        May 18, 2016 at 13:50

        Having the future of gaming in some 6+ year old chubby little kid’s hands gave me shivers, and now i’m depressed, really hope things change before we are playing Mass Effect: The MOBA or The Witcher: Protect The Lanes of Kaer Morhen

        Reply

        • Darren Peach

          May 18, 2016 at 13:52

          Technically speaking, A six year old playing the type of games that appeal to us is bad parenting. But I knows the feelz.

          Reply

          • Ghost In The Rift

            May 18, 2016 at 14:30

            Didn’t know parenting was still a thing huehuehue.

          • Darren Peach

            May 18, 2016 at 14:56

            My sister is a new mommy. Holy smokes, Every single thing is a thing with her. No vaccines…. No crawling on the grass… I doubt he will see a video game until he is 23.

          • Ghost In The Rift

            May 18, 2016 at 16:47

            I think a intervention is required lol

  6. Matthew Holliday

    May 18, 2016 at 12:51

    Single player gives games flavour.
    gives the user context.

    Sure jumping on the star wars hype train is sorta a good excuse, but can they really say they did everything possible to bring us the best gaming experience they could? doubtfull, it was in developement for years, they cut the SP out day 1 without really considering it.
    And with EA, the singleplayer games always run okay, its the multiplayer that causes delays and serious errors.

    Reply

  7. Anon A Mouse

    May 18, 2016 at 12:55

    I only do single player, if there is no single player then there is no purchase. But if the single player is just a bolt on as an after thought I will also not buy it. Besides games are bloody expensive these days, you’ll have to be super duper convincing that your game and story line have enough flesh on the bones before I will invest in it.

    Reply

  8. Darren Peach

    May 18, 2016 at 13:02

    Chhhhhh…………..OPS !

    Reply

  9. Darren Peach

    May 18, 2016 at 13:04

    I really enjoyed Bad Company. Truckasauris Rex…..Anyone ?

    Reply

  10. BakedBagel

    May 18, 2016 at 13:58

    I had actually completely forgotten about Battlefront.

    Lmao at people who pre-ordered that. Nice dead game :^)

    Reply

    • miaau

      May 18, 2016 at 15:06

      It seems to me it is on sale every 2nd week on Xbox Live sales.

      Reply

  11. Raptor Rants

    May 18, 2016 at 15:17

    So EA just openly admitted to money grabbing for the sake of money grabbing instead of caring about the customer?

    *starts slow clap*

    Reply

  12. Raptor Rants

    May 18, 2016 at 15:20

    Ok. Ok. Just…. Give me a second to get my thoughts straight here.

    Reply

  13. Raptor Rants

    May 18, 2016 at 15:29

    Ok so here’s where we are right now on this. EA openly said they wanted to release alongside the Force Awakens to capitalise on sales as the Star Wars fever would be really strong at that point. I get that. It’s a fairly good business move…. If the game was what it could have been.
    Honestly this is the biggest problem with the gaming industry at the moment. It’s all about the microtransactions and season passes and and and and. Its all just about more and more and more income. More revenue from the customer.

    This is absolutely atrocious behaviour from the big heads from the likes of EA. How dare EA so openly admit they don’t care how complete or well rounded their games are and that it’s all about ONLY THE SALES and releasing it so that it has the biggest impact while KNOWINGLY removing a portion of the game they KNOW should have been there.

    The worst of it? “and I would say that the game was done very well for us, and reached a very different demographic that a traditional EA game would do. So from that perspective it’s a success.” followed by “but if you take a step back and look at our overall portfolio, it’s actually in pretty good shape.”

    REALLY??? You openly admit you maybe should have had a single player, then you admit that it was pushed for the movie release and then you go and say that you don’t care though because your overall profile looks good?

    Wake up people. This is why the gaming industry is as it is. Gamers keep giving money where it isn’t deserved and like idiots we fall for it all every single time.

    But the worst of it is that corporations like EA know what they are doing and can openly admit it and then say “We are screwing you but we are sitting pretty. Oh and we’ll tell you this honestly because we think you are all too stupid to see what we are doing”

    EA should be ashamed of what they are doing but never will be.

    I mean honestly. Honestly!? Who are the real idiots though? EA for so openly admitting it or the gamers for just simply not caring and still giving away all their cash for what is blatant money grabbing?

    Reply

  14. Strawman Jim

    May 18, 2016 at 20:00

    Filed under Capitalism!

    Reply

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