Forgot password
Enter the email address you used when you joined and we'll send you instructions to reset your password.
If you used Apple or Google to create your account, this process will create a password for your existing account.
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Reset password instructions sent. If you have an account with us, you will receive an email within a few minutes.
Something went wrong. Try again or contact support if the problem persists.
star-wars-battlefront-2.jpg

Uncharted Dev Explains The Troubles With EA’s Cancelled Star Wars Game

I fondly remember the golden years of Star Wars gaming. Everything from the ultra-detailed and incredibly satisfying X-Wing space shooter series to the moral thicket of Knights of the Old Republic to hurling stormtroopers to their doom in Jedi Outcast. It seemed that whatever kind of game experience you wanted, you could get it in a Star Wars title.
This article is over 5 years old and may contain outdated information

I fondly remember the golden years of Star Wars gaming. Everything from the ultra-detailed and incredibly satisfying X-Wing space shooter series to the moral thicket of Knights of the Old Republic to hurling stormtroopers to their doom in Jedi Outcast. It seemed that whatever kind of game experience you wanted, you could get it in a Star Wars title.

Recommended Videos

Disney’s purchase of the franchise should’ve heralded a new era of development, with hopes initially very high when EA won the sole rights to make Star Wars games. Six years later though and what have we got? Two average multiplayer shooters more known for their predatory microtransactions and loot boxes than their iffy gameplay.

It could have been so different, too. Dead Space developer Visceral Games teamed up with Uncharted creator Amy Hennig for what was promised to be a AAA adventure in the mold of Sony’s hit series. The game would’ve been set in the aftermath of the destruction of Alderaan and followed a roguish hero in the Han Solo mold as he figured out his loyalties in the Galactic Civil War. We recently reported that the project might have been further along than first assumed, but now Hennig’s explained that the development wasn’t all plain sailing:

“So I think Visceral was sort of beset with a lot of challenges. Even so, we were making a game; people have said it was an ‘Uncharted Star Wars.’ That’s sort of reductive, but it’s useful because people can kind of visualize something in their head. But what that meant is we obviously had to take the Frostbite Engine, because there was the internal initiative to make sure that everybody was on the same technology, but it was an engine that was made to do first-person shooters not third-person traversal cinematic games. So building all of that third-person platforming and climbing and cover taking and all that stuff into an engine that wasn’t made to do that.”

EA’s Frostbite Engine has a fair amount of notoriety in the industry. Originally developed by DICE for use in the Battlefield series, the current iteration of the engine can turn out some seriously impressive visuals. Unfortunately though, as Hennig explains, it’s geared towards FPS games and adapting it to run a third person action adventure would definitely be an uphill struggle. Bioware famously nearly came a cropper when developing Dragon Age: Inquisition on Frostbite, only to discover that there were no provisions for the engine to have an inventory system or AI party members, both of which are pretty important in an RPG.

While Visceral’s game never came to fruition, Hennig goes on to explain that at the very least, some of the tweaks they developed were used by other EA developers in their titles, so it wasn’t a complete wash. Still, the loss of a genuinely great single-player Star Wars adventure weighs heavy in the heart.


We Got This Covered is supported by our audience. When you purchase through links on our site, we may earn a small affiliate commission. Learn more about our Affiliate Policy
Author
Image of David James
David James
I'm a writer/editor who's been at the site since 2015. Love writing about video games and will crawl over broken glass to write about anything related to Hideo Kojima. But am happy to write about anything and everything, so long as it's interesting!