For nearly 10 years, EA has held exclusivity on rights to develop Star Wars games, a deal that many have felt limited the number and kinds of releases that could utilize the license. While the publisher has had a few major successes in the realm, most notably with the recent Jedi: Fallen Order and Squadrons games, there’s also been a fraught history of false starts and canceled titles that never saw the light of day.
The formation of Lucasfilm Games was announced earlier this week, a banner and licensor for Star Wars games. Speculation that EA would be losing Star Wars exclusivity was correct, with an open-world Star Wars game revealed to be coming from Ubisoft’s Massive Entertainment. However, the wider licensing of Star Wars to other publishers and developers doesn’t mean that EA is done with Star Wars. We’ll keep getting EA Star Wars games even as more companies get the opportunity to show what they can do with the license.
In fact, not only will EA continue to develop Star Wars games, Lucasfilm Games already has some projects in the works with the publisher.
“We’re really proud of the games we have created with EA,” Douglas Reilly, VP of Lucasfilm Games says. “We will continue working with them and our relationship has never been stronger. While we may not have a lot of details to share at the moment, we’ve got a number of projects underway with the talented teams at EA.”
At least one of these projects is undoubtedly the rumored follow up to Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order. In fact, EA confirmed last year that it was the start of a new franchise. Lucasfilm Games is also expected to be looking at the successes of Battlefront and Squadrons to see what more EA can do with those areas of expertise.
Lucasfilm Games’ goal is to amplify and connect Star Wars games to a broader canon Star Wars universe, leveraging the talents of unique publishers and developers. “We try and help them leverage their passion, expertise, and idea by bringing our expertise around the IP, our ability to connect with other parts of Lucasfilm and The Walt Disney Company, to amplify that. To make it even bigger than they might imagine,” Reilly says. “We want to uncover the stories they’ve always imagined telling and make them resonate with our fans, and across the wider Star Wars galaxy.”
EA also reaffirmed their commitment to Star Wars games and an ongoing partnership with Lucasfilm Games in a tweet.
We love Star Wars.
We look forward to continuing our partnership with Lucasfilm Games.
We’re making more Star Wars games.
BD-1 is still the cutest.— Electronic Arts (@EA) January 13, 2021
Lucasfilm Games also announced an Indiana Jones games coming from Bethesda’s MachineGames. They’ve promised additional announcements and surprises in the future as well.
“This is really the culmination of years of preparing to come out and say, ‘We’re here, we’ve got a team of people, we’re going to make a lot of great games, and here’s some new things you weren’t expecting from us to do that we’re now starting to do,’” says Reilly. “And that’s going to continue throughout the next year or so, where we’re going to continue to announce projects that are more representative of the legacy of the old Lucasfilm Games that we’re now trying to live up to.”
