Home Gaming EA is the home of Star Wars for the next ten years

EA is the home of Star Wars for the next ten years

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death-star

It’s a good time to be a Star Wars fan. Slave bikinis are back in fashion, a new trilogy of films are on the way and even though Lucasarts may be dead, (most) of the games from that galaxy far away certainly aren’t. EA is home to Star Wars games now. And they’re in it for the long run.

At the UBS Global Technology Conference (via AGB), EA CFO Blake Jorgenson spoke about how Disney approached EA to handle upcoming Star Wars games for them, which resulted in a ten year commitment.

“We had a long relationship obviously with Lucas on the original Star Wars and when Disney took over Lucas, they really wanted to maintain a video game business around Star Wars,” Jorgenson said.

And so they came to us because of our partnership and they knew that we could help them develop really great games and we struck what we believe is a fantastic deal which allows us to be able to build games in many different genres across multiple types of platforms over 10 years and we’ll leverage the strength of the Disney marketing associated with the Star Wars properties both in movies and other things that they may do over the timeframe.

We’ll try to align those with that marketing, power the Disney has so it will get aligned with timing around the movies, but it won’t necessarily be aligned with the movie.

And it looks like those future games will be taking some inspiration from the upcoming new trilogy of films, that has director J.J Abrams in charge of the first film. But not all games will be tied to past and present films, Jorgenson explained.

Yes, definitely very much – so, very much around the historical types of games as in play plus new games that we’re inventing around their content, around the broad Star Wars content, and around some of the new assets that they may produce over time as well.

I’m all for new games using the Star Wars universe as an inspiration. That’s pretty much how we got The Force Unleashed, one of my favourite games of this generation. While I’m sure the next Battlefield game will find an audience though, it’s not the Star Wars that I personally want.

Give me action, suspense and space battles with some new characters, and I’ll be plenty happy. Or just resurrect 1313 at least, dammit.

Last Updated: November 21, 2013

68 Comments

  1. Resting on Bioware’s laurels again……

    Reply

    • Captain GUZ

      November 21, 2013 at 15:30

      Its like Boiware went to the darkside

      Reply

      • ToshZA

        November 21, 2013 at 15:32

        Bioware and Palpatine are the same thing, at first they appear as the kind, caring senator, but the real plan was galactic domination from the get-go. Bioware didn’t go to the dark side, they ARE the dark side. EA is just the Darth Vader, the pawn, the face of it all, the one to blame for the malady that has befallen the galaxy.

        Reply

        • Ultimo_Cleric N7

          November 22, 2013 at 08:18

          No man, sorry but Bioware were great until EA got their grumbby claws into them.

          Reply

  2. ToshZA

    November 21, 2013 at 15:04

    Witcher 3 cross KOTOR, and we have ourselves a new favourite.

    Reply

    • Alien Emperor Trevor

      November 21, 2013 at 15:06

      That would be epic. The only problem being each lightsaber colour will be a $2 DLC thanks to EA.

      Reply

      • ToshZA

        November 21, 2013 at 15:13

        $1.99 man, don’t forget the 100% BS marketing fad of 0.99.

        With a pack of new outfits and a cool new colour scheme for your starship at $9.99, and the DLC announced before release date with a whole hour’s extra gameplay for only $5.99, or buy the season pass for $29.99 and get all colours and outfits thrown in for free.

        Reply

        • Alien Emperor Trevor

          November 21, 2013 at 15:20

          I looked at AC4 on Steam last night. It’s the game for $60, a season pass for $20 & another 6 DLCs totalling $9. That just made me mad. And this is just on release, I’m guessing there’s more coming.

          Reply

          • ToshZA

            November 21, 2013 at 15:22

            This is the real reason that next-gen titles won’t be increasing in price, because for the full experience you gotta get the extra $30 DLC.

          • Alien Emperor Trevor

            November 21, 2013 at 15:23

            Inderdaad.

          • Lardus-Resident Perve

            November 21, 2013 at 15:23

            DLC within 6 months of the game releasing is a rip-off in my opinion.

          • ToshZA

            November 21, 2013 at 15:24

            So far the only exception to this I can find or think of is Borderlands 2.

          • Alien Emperor Trevor

            November 21, 2013 at 15:27

            Borderlands 2, as much as I love it & the season pass content, has annoyed me with this trend too. They’ve released dozens of separate DLCs.

          • ToshZA

            November 21, 2013 at 15:29

            Yeah, those cosmetic ones are annoying as hell. The extra classes and other content packs are cool, but those false content packs (the lvl 61/72 updates) are also annoying. No game with DLC is free of this virus.

          • Guest

            November 21, 2013 at 16:47

            Or XCOM. “You can get this special extra DLC stuff if you buy the day 1 version”. Ends up selling the day 1 version for a year.

          • Lardus-Resident Perve

            November 21, 2013 at 16:56

            The Elite Soldier pack – yes, that was not nice. I got it though with my game. Was it not just cosmetic? I have less issues with cosmetic changes than with game defining/changing day one dlc (e.g Prothean for ME3)

  3. Alien Emperor Trevor

    November 21, 2013 at 15:05

    Wait and see.

    Reply

  4. HvR

    November 21, 2013 at 15:12

    Get ready for your always online single player cross over Star Wars experience.

    Reply

  5. Jim Lenoir (Banana Jim)

    November 21, 2013 at 15:12

    Meh!

    Reply

    • That Tall Twit

      November 21, 2013 at 15:56

      Seconded.

      Reply

  6. Gareth L

    November 21, 2013 at 15:12

    Battlefield: Star Wars!

    Reply

  7. Gareth L

    November 21, 2013 at 15:19

    Command & Conquer: The Empire Strikes Back, again!

    Reply

    • Unavengedavo(aka. MadeYouLook)

      November 21, 2013 at 15:45

      The Sims 4: Star Wars

      Reply

      • Kensei Seraph

        November 21, 2013 at 16:04

        Oh please no.

        Reply

  8. Vampyre Squirrel

    November 21, 2013 at 15:21

    Will see what EA does with this… they’ll get the sith poop award if they kill it

    Reply

    • John's (JJ's) Annihilation

      November 21, 2013 at 15:46

      So they’re guaranteed an award then!

      Reply

      • Vampyre Squirrel

        November 21, 2013 at 15:47

        Yeah… they’ll get the Sith Poop award and get infested by a thousand Sith Squirrels

        Reply

        • John's (JJ's) Annihilation

          November 21, 2013 at 15:49

          You’re no doubt a child of the dark side, I see.

          Reply

          • Vampyre Squirrel

            November 21, 2013 at 15:50

            Who me? Nevaaaaaahahahahahahahaa!!!!!

          • John's (JJ's) Annihilation

            November 21, 2013 at 15:51

            Vampyre Squirrel!

  9. Lardus-Resident Perve

    November 21, 2013 at 15:22

    KotoR – great games. Star Wars : Rebellion – best SW strategy game ever. Star Wars : Empire at War was meh, but if some of the good ideas out of that could be mixed with the scope and depth of Rebellion, it could be truly EPIC!

    Reply

    • Alien Emperor Trevor

      November 21, 2013 at 15:23

      Jedi Knight!

      Reply

      • ToshZA

        November 21, 2013 at 15:24

        What was that old FPS star wars game? It was in the DOOM days, same kind of graphics, I love the hell out of that game.

        Reply

        • Alien Emperor Trevor

          November 21, 2013 at 15:24

          The Doom-like one was Dark Forces. Jedi Knight was after that.

          Reply

          • ToshZA

            November 21, 2013 at 15:28

            Dark forces appears to be correct. The rest of the series is too 3D, never played those ones.

          • Alien Emperor Trevor

            November 21, 2013 at 15:30

            “appears to be” IS! 😛 I have the original disk.

            The 3D ones were really fun back then. I doubt they’d look that great today.

          • ToshZA

            November 21, 2013 at 15:34

            hahaha, yeah I don’t have the disks anymore. Long gone, along with some other old favourites such as Silver. Oddly, I still have the box for Silver, just not the game disk. I lent it to a friend probably, never got it back.

  10. Captain GUZ

    November 21, 2013 at 15:29

    So how is EA going milk this to death? DLC, micro transactions or season passes.
    Any bets people?

    Reply

    • ToshZA

      November 21, 2013 at 15:30

      All of the above.

      Reply

      • Captain GUZ

        November 21, 2013 at 15:53

        And so the plot thickens…..

        Reply

        • That Tall Twit

          November 21, 2013 at 15:54

          Can’t stop laughing at that one.

          Reply

          • Unavengedavo(aka. MadeYouLook)

            November 21, 2013 at 16:08

            The discovery of cows milk…

          • Captain GUZ

            November 21, 2013 at 16:10

            dat look!!!! hahahahaha

          • loftie

            November 21, 2013 at 16:24

            hahah “me gusta”

    • Alien Emperor Trevor

      November 21, 2013 at 15:33

      I’m sure they’ll innovate & come up with something in addition to those.

      Reply

    • John's (JJ's) Annihilation

      November 21, 2013 at 15:53

      DLC’s. No doubt.

      Reply

    • Gr8_Balls_o_Fire

      November 21, 2013 at 16:16

      Collector’s Edition: A torch

      Reply

    • Brady miaau

      November 21, 2013 at 16:24

      You mean, how is EA going to take my money, because I am so desperate for any form of half way decent Star Wars game I may well fork out for Call of Duty Star Wars Edition.

      Um, Who makes Call of Duty?

      Reply

  11. Unavengedavo(aka. MadeYouLook)

    November 21, 2013 at 15:38

    Too soon?

    Reply

    • Vampyre Squirrel

      November 21, 2013 at 15:41

      WAY too soon!

      Reply

    • ToshZA

      November 21, 2013 at 15:43

      You are a cruel man. I love it. 😀

      Reply

    • That Tall Twit

      November 21, 2013 at 15:54

      LOL!

      Reply

  12. oVg

    November 21, 2013 at 15:41

    Get your extra extended light saber via micro transaction.

    Reply

  13. John's (JJ's) Annihilation

    November 21, 2013 at 15:45

    Way to ruin Star Wars for everyone.

    Reply

    • Alien Emperor Trevor

      November 21, 2013 at 15:46

      But Star Wars is for EAveryone.

      Reply

      • John's (JJ's) Annihilation

        November 21, 2013 at 15:46

        No!

        Reply

        • Alien Emperor Trevor

          November 21, 2013 at 15:51

          Search your feelings!

          Reply

          • John's (JJ's) Annihilation

            November 21, 2013 at 15:51

            I can’t be!

    • Anon A Mouse

      November 21, 2013 at 15:47

      Star Wars was ruined by the last trilogy anyway.

      Reply

      • John's (JJ's) Annihilation

        November 21, 2013 at 15:48

        It was. JarJar single handedly almost ruined it.
        I enjoyed the Family Guy versions of Star Wars more than I did the prequels.

        Reply

  14. John's (JJ's) Annihilation

    November 21, 2013 at 15:50

    If only that header pic was real we could blow up the Death Star and bye bye EA.

    Reply

  15. UltimateNinjaPandaDudeGuy

    November 22, 2013 at 09:42

    Who would you like to be in control of Star Wars?

    My vote… CD Projekt RED or Valve. Would probably say CD Projekt RED if I had to choose one.

    Reply

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