Nearly half a century after George Lucas introduced the world to Star Wars, the franchise remains a household name and one of the biggest media properties of all time. With nine mainline films and two spinoffs, multiple television shows, a bevy of video games and a variety of comics, there are few people who haven’t at least heard the names “Luke Skywalker” or “Darth Vader.” So, it’s no surprise that any company that can capitalize on the success of the series using their respective form of media, and that’s exactly what EA has done since 2013 when they purchased the exclusive rights to create Star Wars games for the indefinite future.
EA’s entries in the Star Wars universe so far include shooters Battlefront and Battlefront II and 2019’s action-adventure game Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order, all of which have been confirmed to be canon. Meanwhile, the fourth game from the publisher will be a strictly space-based dogfighting title called Star Wars: Squadrons, which is scheduled to release on October 2nd, 2020.
But not every EA Star Wars game has survived through development to make it into the hands of gamers, and according to the developer of the now canceled Project Ragtag, we’re really missing something special. During an interview with MinnMaxShow, the defunct game’s producer, Zach Mumbach, had this to say about an exciting part of the project that he never had the opportunity to share publicly:
[It was] this crazy AT-ST moment which was really cool. You were on foot running from it and it was trying to hunt you down but you were more agile, slipping through these alleyways, barreling through and crashing and using all the destruction of Frostbite. You would have been like ‘Oh, that’s like Star Wars Uncharted‘.
The Uncharted comparison makes sense, too, as the game was being directed by that franchise’s lead writer Amy Hennig. During the interview, Mumbach spoke highly of her as well, saying:
I’m thinking, this is effing Amy Hennig. We have the chance to make the greatest Star Wars game ever made and a possible Game of the Year contender.
Sadly, it’s unlikely we’ll ever see the return of Project Ragtag, as EA apparently pressured the developers to finish the game despite there being significant internal trouble during its development, leading to the project ultimately failing. In the time since, many of the devs from the team have moved on to Crystal Dynamics to work on Marvel’s Avengers, and Mumbach has since moved on to indie developer The Wandering Band, LLC.
That said, EA will remain in sole possession of the rights to create Star Wars games until mid-2024, and they’ve made it clear they plan to double down on titles in the franchise, including more entries in the Jedi: Fallen Order series. So, worry not, fans, there will be plenty more Star Wars experiences coming your way.
