(l) Mass Effect Universe protagonist
(r) Stormtrooper from Star Wars Battlefront 3
Over the weekend, a report was released stating that EA, formerly Electronic Arts, had to choose between two big and failing sci-fi video game franchises to push…and I’m sure there’s a lot of debate going on if they chose wisely. This tweet from Pirat_Nation summarizes, since their source is behind a paywall. There’s something fitting about that, given EA’s recent actions elsewhere.
According to Bloomberg’s investigation, EA decided to prioritize a new Star Wars multiplayer game instead of continuing development on the next Mass Effect.
Star Wars won: EA had two major sci-fi projects competing for investment, each expected to cost hundreds of millions of dollars.
Mass Effect was cancelled: EA chose Battlefront 3, believing Star Wars was a safer investment.
Was it, though? It could be. I haven’t played any of the Star Wars: Battlefront games and I only had a chance to partly play the first Mass Effect, so I can’t speak to which is superior as a game or even as a story. This is the view of an outsider looking in and doing some research, so take my perspective for what it is. Still, as fans rally around #SaveMassEffect and I don’t know anyone who is a massive Battlefront fan personally, it’s an interesting bit of information. Both games have leaked trailers because both games were cancelled during production. The more I read, though, the more curious the choice becomes to me.
Star Wars: Battlefront 3 was supposed to be an entry in the regular franchise, while tie-in games and the first two were already made. As it is, the franchise is a spinoff of the Battlefield franchise, made by the same developer (DICE) but set in real world wars of the past, as Star Wars: Battlefront, it’s one main sequel, and a bunch of spinoff games, are set in battles of the Star Wars franchise. You can play as either a Rebel (or I assume one of the Clone Wars clones) or the Imperials/Separatists, depending on when the game is set. I’m guessing that if a third official game did finally get made they would have gone with the sequel trilogy, playing as the Resistance or the First Order.
As already discussed, Mass Effect Universe would have been an attempt to get past the days of the Mass Effect: Andromeda mess, getting out of the war scenario and going with a group fighting to stop the wars before they start. From what little we know of the game it would have been more of a spy or secret agent feel. I’ll still refer to the player character as Player.
This sets up the big difference between the two, even more than the licensing I’ll get to. Battlefront is a multiplayer experience, probably with just enough story to explain why you’re shooting a bunch of people with blasters. Mass Effect and it’s sequels and spinoffs are a single player game where you can call your allies to help you or let them run around and hope the AI is programmed to actually be intelligent. The other difference is ownership. EA licenses Star Wars to make related games but through the purchase of BioWare, which recently got shut down after the cancellation of Universe and the abject failure of Dragon Age: The Veilguard, EA owns the Mass Effect franchise. However, as God Is A Gamer makes note:
Executives regarded the Star Wars shooter as lower risk and judged it more likely to succeed than another Mass Effect, the sources said. Pressure from a debt load of roughly $18 billion, taken on through the leveraged buyout that took EA private, hung over that review of the slate. Repayment is expected to come from operating profits, leaving leaders focused on trimming losses and lifting returns.
Other considerations also played a part, according to the report, including weaker reviews for BioWare’s recent games compared with its earlier hits and internal corporate politics. Among the executive changes it described was the sidelining of EA Entertainment president Laura Miele, a longtime supporter of BioWare and Mass Effect.
A leveraged buyout. I’ve seen enough episodes of Company Man to know that never goes well. I’ve also seen a report or two saying that Mass Effect Universe was further along, but EA still shelved it for another Battlefront game. Now both games are MIA. So if another Star Wars: Battlefront game was so important, why did they not make it after choosing the licenced work over their own? If the worry is how badly Andromeda did, EA was the one who made BioWare change game engines mid-production. I hear more complaints about the bugs than the story, meaning either it was the bugs that killed that game or the story was that boring.
Again, EA pays for Star Wars and is already doing a bunch of other Star Wars games, including one of BioWare’s active successes, the online MMO Star Wars: The Old Republic. BioWare even started earning its fame on Knights Of The Old Republic before moving to their own franchises. Mass Effect and Dragon Age used to be two of the biggest names in video games, just as Star Wars used to be one of the biggest names in movies. In none of those properties is that the case anymore. While Star Wars’ failures are mostly with DisneyFilm and the actions of Kathleen Kennedy (and to a lesser extent Bob Iger, who bragged about throwing out George Lucas’ suggestions for the next trilogy only to make a disaster of it and the questionably thought out Disney Plus shows), BioWare’s failures have been their own.
The Veilguard suffered from linear storytelling and expelling the ability to explore while pushing a social message. Gameplay took a backseat, as some villains were either too easy to beat or dirty cheaters that created a faux sense of a challenge. The result was a game that wasn’t fun to play and a story that’s highly ridiculed, none of which matches up to BioWare’s history because the people who made that history weren’t working for BioWare at the time. Fresh minded creators shouldn’t replace the old ones, nor should the old ones hold things back. Old and new should work together to keep what fans loved but evolve the property, and that’s not what happens anymore. Not helping are activist groups pretending to be consultant firm and really just want the money as much as to spread a message that takes the fun out of the experience. Mass Effect: Andromeda suffered from…
Yeah, that. Nobody even cares about the story, and Mass Effect 3 had some issues there. Depending on the path you chose in the third game and throughout the series (you could play 3 without the other games, as they offered a way to catch players up), some of the endings weren’t satisfactory as BioWare didn’t keep up with every option when it came to creating the multiple endings. I’m not hip to the details since I still couldn’t move the stupid ship in the first game once the Normandy was handed over to me and I didn’t get to go back yet. I just know the people who liked the endings were the ones who made the “right” choices and the ones that didn’t decided every choice they made didn’t matter to how things turned out.
Star Wars may be the bigger brand, due to decades of good material being put out before fools took over (then again, Lucas wasn’t without his own missteps, as the prequels are only reassessed because of the failings of the sequels being a total failure instead of a few odd choices), but that hasn’t been the case since the Disney purchase. Kathleen Kennedy tried to change what Star Wars was, and there’s no proof that Dave Filoni will put things back. If anything, he’s shown in his works that he’s not a fan of the Jedi either, and seems to also want to replace the Skywalkers, just with his creations instead of Kennedy’s. EA’s not exactly batting a perfect game, either. Star Wars: Outlaws has become its own laughing stock of bugs and bad story ideas, after the success of the Star Wars: Jedi game and its sequels. Plus you’re paying money for that license, and you chose the Star Wars spinoff to a war games shooter–then failed to actually make the game you chose.
Throw in EA’s decisions in other games, like live-service (always adding bonus content to keep getting money), loot crates (didn’t one of the Battlefront games get in trouble for those?), putting multiplayer into games that didn’t require it, online servers to prove your game isn’t pirated whether you can be online all the time or not…all the usual demands from some higher up who doesn’t understand how those works and just thinks they need more money coming in forever or just believes in the power of gimmicks over actually fun and engaging content and gameplay. That’s not just hitting the Star Wars games. EA and other “AAA” studios are making those mistakes and hiring consultants more interested with stereotype representation (as opposed to the real thing, which requires not compartmentalizing humanity like a toy collection) than making a good game because that’s not what their job is.
I actually do believe EA made the wrong choice here. Plenty of other Star Wars games were coming out, using Battlefront’s game engine in a Mass Effect game contributed to its failure–did you not have the rights to the engine BioWare was using?, and there were somehow still enough fans after the faux pas of the third game and disaster of the first spinoff that Mass Effect should have still been a money maker. Then they cancelled the game they chose anyway, and continued events that led to BioWare’s closing, some of which BioWare themselves get the blame for but let’s not pretend EA didn’t have a hand in it.
Maybe if they actually let people who knew what they were doing do what they do and just made sure they stayed in budget at a decent pace and release schedule, things would be better. We don’t live in that timeline, and it looks like the franchise they buried is the one that isn’t costing them money and they could have actually saved. They don’t control Star Wars’ fate, but they do control Mass Effect’s. Get the good creators back and let them work their magic while teaching the next generation. Again, I’m on the outside but it sounds like a good business plan to me. What do I know, I’m only a fan who creates things.
