Games like Assassin’s Creed Valhalla and Immortals Fenyx Rising both utilize paid resource packs that speed up progression, not unlike the model used in Battlefront II. Ubisoft’s reliance on microtransactions makes the move puzzling more than anything else. Ubisoft has taken steps to right its wrongs since the news broke last summer, but players can’t be blamed for feeling like the rights to Star Wars simply moved from one problematic mega-studio to another. The studio’s recent sexual misconduct scandal forced top executives out of the company, sending it into rebuild mode. From a PR standpoint, Ubisoft is in a more unstable standing with gamers now than EA was in 2017. Still, it’s hard not to feel like Disney has taken a step backwards with the deal.
Ubisoft has the open-world formula down to a science thanks to series like Assassin’s Creed, and it’s easy to imagine titles in that vein becoming cash cows for Disney.
What’s especially puzzling is Disney’s decision to pass the baton to Ubisoft for an open-world Star Wars title. The timing just feels off in 2021 as EA was finally sticking the landing and giving the brand its first era of consistency in well over a decade. Taking exclusivity rights away from EA in 2018 would have been a justified decision that few would have disagreed with, myself included. Squadrons found an exciting new way to bring the series’ epic space fights to life thanks to excellent VR support. Jedi: Fallen Order successfully took elements from Dark Souls, Metroid, and Uncharted to create one of the better single-player Star Wars games to hit shelves yet. Perhaps most importantly, EA’s newer titles presented an exciting creative vision for the franchise.
Add in the company’s long-term commitment to supporting Battlefront II, which received updates through 2020, and it seemed like EA was on the right track. While it would have been easy for the company to squeeze in a paid component, the restraint seemed to indicate that the company had learned from the mistake, at least when it came to the Star Wars brand. The difference between Squadrons and Battlefront II’s launches were night and day.
EA even decided to break its own promise by offering unplanned free content based on the enthusiastic response from fans. The aerial combat game was imagined as a “you-get-what-you-paid-for” experience that didn’t feature any microtransactions or pricey DLC. Just last fall, it returned to multiplayer with Star Wars: Squadrons. The studio went on to release Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order in 2019, which focused on single-player storytelling with no hidden fees. In the short few years since that historic fallout, EA appeared to take the backlash to heart. EA responded by disabling microtransactions entirely prior to launch, but for many players, the well was irreversibly poisoned. When a fan complained about the system on Reddit, EA replied by noting that the system was meant to inspire a sense of “pride and accomplishment.” The comment quickly became the most downvoted comment in Reddit history. Players didn’t need to pony up to unlock paid content, but doing it the old-fashioned way required dozens of hours of grinding. EA implemented an aggressive microtransaction strategy into the game that affected the game’s progression and created a “pay-to-win” environment. Players’ good faith was quickly squandered with its sequel, Star Wars Battlefront II. In 2015, EA successfully brought back the Star Wars Battlefront brand with a fun multiplayer revival. A new hopeĮA and Disney’s Star Wars partnership started off strong enough. While the change ultimately feels positive, it’s hard to shake the feeling that the rug is getting pulled out on EA just as it was finding its footing. EA has had a troubled history with the series since entering into the deal in 2013. Many gaming fans found the news to be a positive step for the franchise, and for good reason. Instead, Disney opted to open the series back up to other developers and gave Ubisoft the reins to its first post-EA game. In 2021’s first bit of bombshell gaming news, Disney announced it had decided to end a long-running partnership with EA that granted the studio exclusive development rights to the Star Wars franchise.