Grave Gamer News & Views — ea

The Inquisition is Coming in October

Bioware’s flame licked fantasy jewel is back with a dragon-y vengeance, and we’ve but one season to wait out for it.

Dragon Age: Inquisition will be bringing on the fantasy RPG/virtual romancing action fans have come to love October 7th, 2014. While this Third Age of Dragons will be available on PS3 and Xbox 360, Inquisitionalso marks Bioware’s very first foray...

What’s Next for Titanfall?

Respawn Entertainment’s community manager, Abbie Heppe, dropped some subtle hints to IGN about what players can come to expect, and not expect, from their mech-centric online shooter’s still brewing DLC.

For starters, if you were hoping to clamor aboard any titan models besides the three available on-disc, Abbie’s about to crush your dreams like a mech flattening a pilot. It seems appeasing you mecha fetishists out there – Wikipedia says I should call you technosexuals but that makes you sound like you get off to Moby – could possibly endanger the game’s stability.

“In order to [add a Titan] it takes so much balancing to make all the Titan abilities work with each other, and then against pilots. It’s a huge undertaking,” Heppe divulged. “Originally we just had the Atlas titans and then the team refused to add in the rest of the Titans until we were all sure that that one fitted perfectly with everything else in the game, so… I’m not announcing any new Titans right now!”

Spot-on balancing has been the cornerstone area of praise in almost every positive review Titanfall garnered since dropping from the stratosphere and into stores Tuesday. Not impossible to add new titan units, but not a task the dev team is anxious to jump at this soon after launch.

What we may see instead in future DLC are more of the exotic aliens indigenous to the battlefield IMC and Militia soldiers wage war upon. “We’re trying to give players as much of a varied look at things as we can so that is definitely a possibility,” said Heppe.

Once Titanfall is successfully released in its projected territories, the Respawn team will shift focus to free updates that’ll pad the game with additional features and modes. Downloadable content, the marquee of which is brand new maps, will follow.

Afterwards, what of sequels? Will Sony consoles see the first-person grace of Titanfall? IGN asked and Heppe “answered.”

“Vince, our CEO, has come out and said that while we’re exclusive for this game, it doesn’t limit us regarding console exclusivity for any of the future things we do.”

What a very exciting future that could be indeed. In the meanwhile, excuse me while throttle my PS4 until it learns to read X1 discs.

EA and Disney’s Star Wars Deal a Decade Long Dynasty

The partnership between video game publisher Electronic Arts and entertainment empire Disney to produce games based in the Star Wars universe is reportedly a ten year deal.

Despite an early scare in which Disney, having freshly plucked the rights to the multi-million dollar franchise from Lucasfilm, stated intentions to move Star Wars away from big budget console titles in favor of the mobile market, EA reinstilled our faith in the force at E3 by announcing it’d be bringing the Battlefront series back to life under DICE’s tutelage. The news was a welcome departure from the grim future Disney preemptively foretold.

Beyond Battlefront, EA’s financial officer Blake Jorgensen said fans should look forward to a wide breadth of games based not just in J.J. Abrams’ new trilogy but titles featuring the whole of the extended Star Wars universe. “The beauty of the Star Wars franchise is it’s so broad and so deep you don’t have to do a movie game,” said Jorgensen, speaking at the UBS Global Tech Conference. “You can do a game that’s very focused on the world that’s been created around Star Wars.”

That’s not to say this new slew of games won’t mine Episode VII and its sequels for inspiration. Future games will indeed use assets introduced in the new trilogy, though Jorgensen was careful to note EA doesn’t plan on rushing movie tie-in games to hit any one film’s theatrical release. “We’ll try to align [new titles] with that marketing power that Disney has, but it won’t necessarily be aligned with the movies.”

In addition to Battlefront aiming its blasters for a Summer 2015 launch, EA confirmed that DICE – you may already be enjoying their work on Battlefield 4 as we speak… which is rude, since you’re only half paying attention to this article –  has already laid the early foundations for a number of Star Wars titles, all of which are implied to dip into various genres.

I’d call this a verifiable Star Wars renaissance not seen since Episode I opened the floodgates back in ‘99. Rest assured, even if the new films are as eye-gougingly bad, like then, at least we’re bound to receive a few memorable games.

DICE and EA’s Star Wars: Battlefront ‘Well into Development’

“Troubled” is the kind word thrown around when describing the tumultuous experience LucasArts and multiple third-party devs had getting a sequel to 2005’s Battlefront II off of the ground.

With LucasArts recently disbanded in every capacity save for its name and the Star Wars franchise tucked deep within the confines of Disney’s money lined pocket, this long dormant brand returns to the galaxy as, simply, Star Wars: Battlefront, a DICE production; first in a line of several planned Star Wars games to be published by the EA empire.

How far, far away are we from seeing this licensed shooter on next-gen consoles?  Hard to say, but EA Games Label prez, Frank Gibeau, says the title is headlong into development under the same team at DICE that stitched together the Battlefield series.  Likewise, expect the new Battlefront to have Frostbite 3 burning at its core.

“We showed 22 seconds of where we’re going with it and the fan response was very positive.  The DICE team is well into development on that product already, so we feel very bullish about our shooter rotation over the next several years,” said Gibeau during an earnings call sometime after all 22 seconds of the game’s E3 debut.

There’s no doubt EA’s funding and DICE’s collective of talent can finally bring Battlefront to the homestretch.  DICE wouldn’t be my first pick for Star Wars, but that doesn’t make them any less of an inspired choice.

My only concern is whether or not old Battlefront III assets are being used or, barring that, even being kept in mind.  Before Free Radical’s attempt on BFIII went tits up, they managed to incorporate some pretty imaginative ideas – and that was on current gen tech.  The one-two combo of next-gen hardware and Frostbite 3 means expectations put on Battlefront’s shoulders rest right at “amazing” (as if the Battlefront name hadn’t already forced that precedent).

Shots Fired

Just a day after EA’s announcement about how they don’t have a single title in gestation for the Wii U, a bold employee uses the social megaphone that is Twitter to clue us in as to why.

Credited as a Senior Software Engineer and having been with EA since 1999, Bob Summerwill has since sweept his Twitter account of controversy.  You can still check out Bob’s heated, but disarmingly honest, comments on EA and Nintendo’s relationship hereabouts.  Among them, Summerwill criticizes Nintendo for running shop like it’s still 1990.

“They should have ‘done a Sega’ and offered Mario/Zelda as PS4/Durango exclusives."  That’s my favorite, if you were wondering.

You’d figure those in the industry would temper their opinions when speaking on an immensely public platform what with the whole Adam Orth catastrophe fresh in everyone’s minds, but I’m not complaining.  I wouldn’t have "Done a Sega” otherwise and…I simply don’t want to live in that world.